Where We Begin
by forthelongestday
Summary: Edward spends his summers home learning what it means to grow up, and how effortless falling in love can be. AH
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Beta'd by sweeneyanne and pre-read by AlexisDanaan and aerobee82. I love them to pieces.**

**Do not own Twilight.**

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><p><strong><span>May 16, 2011<span>**

The simple truth of the situation was that Edward did not understand. All of his frustration and confusion could be traced back to that one fact. He didn't get it, and he didn't think he ever would. It was driving him insane.

It was like every year he came home to a place that bore almost no resemblance to what he'd left. When he'd first packed his bags and drove out to Massachusetts he was able to say that Jasper and Emmett were the only friends he'd ever really _need_ for the rest of his life. Emmett was the easy one; he was able to see just about anybody's side of any argument, and he was level-headed despite his fun-loving nature. Jasper was the wild-card; the guy Edward could live vicariously through and learn from the mistakes of. Looking back he wasn't so sure what his place was. Maybe he was the middle-ground. Maybe he was the sturdy friend who the rest could always rely on; the one to call if you needed bail money or to just talk something out.

It was a position Edward was comfortable in, and he didn't like the way everything continued to shift and change during his time away. It was almost as if the rest of the town had moved and grown to fill in the gap he'd left behind. His place hadn't been saved for him. It kind of pissed him off.

Standing firm in the center of it all was Bella Swan. A year ago she'd been just another girl. She was Emmett's sister and Jasper's friend, and Edward had been thrust into the equation through those factors. Now she was something else entirely. He couldn't believe how easy it had been to overlook her. One summer spent in each other's company was all it took for her to wrestle her way under his skin, and after more recent events Edward didn't think he'd ever be able to get her out―not that he wanted to.

It only took two hours to unpack the six boxes he'd driven across the country with. The process would have gone a lot faster if he hadn't stopped to examine every picture or take a few moments to recall his favorite parts of each book that made its way back to the shelves in his bedroom. Everything had an assigned place. It was strange, how once everything was unpacked his room looked as if nothing had ever been removed in the first place. The sensation was exactly the same as he remembered it from his first day home from Harvard last summer, and yet so different.

The thing about Bella was that she always managed to turn the world on its head, even though she never tried to.

He'd spent the past four months bombarded with news of her on all sides. There were e-mails from Emmett speculating as to why she'd suddenly dropped out of her first year at the University of Florida to come back to Forks and vague updates from Jasper colored in far too much innuendo—neither compared in the slightest to the sporadic phone calls from the girl standing firm in the center of all of it.

No one seemed to be sure what exactly had happened to Bella―but Edward knew. Or at least he thought he did.

In his more rational moments it was easy to see that it was ridiculous for him to assume that he knew her better than her own brother or the man who blurred and crossed the lines so many times that he'd practically created an entirely new relationship sub-genre all on his own―but the thing was that Emmett hadn't been there to see the look on her face when she shifted her truck into drive to leave for Florida. Jasper may have been the only one around during that first year, when Edward was in Massachusetts and Emmett in California, but Jasper hadn't laid in bed with her on her last night in Forks and listened to her whispered fears and uncertainties about the future. They hadn't seen it coming like Edward had. The night it all caught up with her and came crashing down it wasn't Jasper or Emmett she went searching for some form of validation from. She'd gone to him.

Edward was certain that he had just a little bit more perspective, because he got to see a piece of her that so few others did.

On the other side of the coin was the indisputable fact that when it had finally fallen apart, when Bella couldn't take the pressure and uncertainty any longer, Edward hadn't been the one waiting back home for her return. He'd only been a stop along the path of her regression.

He wished he could have seen it, the exact look on her face when she rolled back into town. For some reason he thought that if he'd been present for all of the scenes, then he would have been able to say he was the only one who fully understood her motives. The picture he did have was foggy at best.

So maybe it really was that no one completely understood what had happened to Bella, but he expected that he'd seen just a little bit more than the rest of them had. She'd always been so straight-laced, calm, focused. She was smart, which was what had intrigued him so much in the first place. In high school they had been friends through circumstance and their pre-existing ties. Really, they were only friends in the first place because of Emmett, and poor ones at that. They'd had a class together his senior year thanks to Forks' meager advanced placement curriculum, and if he thought back he could almost pinpoint the exact moment, the day that she became so suddenly unsure of herself.

It was in April, a Monday after a long weekend, he remembered. The event only stood out in his mind because, from his perspective, it had been so radical. She didn't take notes in class, and she nearly ran him over in her attempt to be the first out of the parking lot at the end of the day. Over a year later she had told him that it was the first time she realized that all her friends were Emmett's friends, and that they were all leaving for college at the end of the upcoming summer, and she'd be left in Forks, alone for another year. She'd said it was the first time she realized that her existence wasn't static, the first time she'd fully understood just how much her life could change in the span of a few short months. He couldn't imagine how relieved she must have been when Jasper decided to forgo the college route, and how guilty she must have felt for it.

Edward had known Bella just as long as anyone else, but the truth was that he didn't really get to _know_ her until after he'd finished his first year at Harvard, and Emmett's presence became more limited. Up until then they were merely part of two social circles which happened to overlap through the influence of mutual friends and family. Now they were… well, he wasn't really sure. All he knew was that he felt like they could be something, and he wanted to know what. The problem was that Bella didn't want to talk about it, and he wasn't sure what he wanted to say anyway.

He wasn't delusional. He knew he had no claim to Bella, and more importantly, that it was a road he should not even be considering continuing down. Still, Edward couldn't convince himself that there was harm in idle daydreams of what might be. At least, he hoped not. Everything would be so much easier if he could figure out where in the hell she stood on all of this―but he hadn't talked to Bella since before his finals, and she was always so tight-lipped on anything that crept across the boundaries. Sometimes he wished she was more like a typical girl who always wanted to talk every little thing to death, but in truth, the fact that she wasn't was one of Edward's favorite things about her.

He liked to tell himself that he slept with her because she was pretty and she was there; that she'd needed some form of comfort―that was why she'd come to him after all―and who was he to refuse her. For that one night Bella wasn't completely off-limits, though that was the biggest lie of all. There was no doubt about it; sleeping with his friend's sister was a disaster. He wasn't sure if falling for her somewhere along the line made it better or worse.

Edward hadn't been able to figure out what to expect when he came home. Part of him was hoping there would be some measure of fanfare and celebration, some vague indication that his presence had been missed over the past ten months. There was a piece of him that hoped Bella had found out what day he was coming back and would be waiting for him. That after two solid weeks of not speaking a word to each other she'd figured out whatever it was that had her so ill at ease and guarded, and he'd be able to say that things between them had, at long last, settled.

The other side of him was intensely pleased to find that wasn't the case. Edward wasn't ready for long talks about his feelings and Bella's feelings and what they should or should not have done. He'd been putting off that conversation just as much as she had, and that, more than anything else, was their problem. Neither Edward nor Bella was ready to step up to the plate and declare themselves a friend, lover, or something in between. Until one of them shored up enough courage to break the tension they were going to be stuck at the same awkward intersection they'd been idling at for months.

After thinking it over far too much, Edward decided that being semi-pleased and wholly confused wasn't that bad of a deal. He'd been prepared for everything to be different, if only because he was. He just wished he knew exactly what all those alterations were instead of having to walk in blind.

His speculation was put to an abrupt end the moment Jasper Whitlock barged straight into the Cullen house, no knock, no doorbell, and proceeded to drag Edward right out of his bedroom and shove him in the front seat of his Camaro with all the subtlety of a freight train. It was good to be home.

Edward wasn't sure where they were going. Actually, he wasn't even sure Jasper had a destination in mind. The only answer he'd gotten when he asked was 'shit, boy, that's no way to say hello.'

Jasper made random turns taking them through the town before another found them heading north toward the highway, all the while ranting about what had to have been the eighth destruction of his relationship with Alice. Edward would never admit it out loud, but he had sincerely missed his friend this past year. School just wasn't the same without someone like Jasper running around and blowing shit up. Figuratively, of course―though there had been at least one incident where it had been literal.

"Dude, bitch is fucking nuts. She's crazy. We're done, for good this time. I'm not putting up with no more of that shit." Jasper wasn't exactly one for eloquence, or subtlety.

Edward didn't believe him for one second.

Every couple of months they had this same one-sided discussion. Jasper would rant and rage about something or another he'd done that Alice apparently considered the last straw. She would break up with him, he'd get drunk and call her names for a couple of days, and then, like clockwork, they'd be back together. Edward considered the frailty of Jasper and Alice's relationship one of the many side-effects Jasper experienced from growing up without a strong female presence in his life. No matter how many problems Edward had, he would always be thankful that wasn't one of them. He couldn't even imagine a world without his mother in it, and he would never put much effort into trying to.

"Maybe if you would stop hitting on everything with two legs then she'd stop breaking up with you." It was a concept that Jasper seemed to have trouble with, although, to be fair, Alice was prone to overreaction. It was a mystery that she managed to tolerate Jasper at all.

"What can I say? I like legs." It seemed that the more time went on, the more Jasper toed over the line dividing what his father had expected from him, no matter how unreasonable, and into what the town as a whole figured he'd turn out to be. Lechery and behaving like a douche-bag included. It wasn't so much that Jasper was a bad guy, more that he liked to cause trouble, and he didn't care very much about what he was rebelling against, so long as he was fighting something.

"Who had her freaking out this time?" Edward asked.

"Bella." He could almost hear Jasper rolling his eyes.

"Again?" Edward scowled. He absolutely despised that Alice might have actually have a legitimate reason to be upset. Last summer it had only taken a week for Edward to decide that it was nothing short of disturbing how close Bella and Jasper had become in the absence of everyone else. He could only imagine how much worse it was after another year. He was not looking forward to witnessing it again, but really, that was more his issue than anything else, and at least he knew it was petty and irrational. That had to count for something.

"No, not again. I told you, that's just how we are. There wasn't even a first time, why's everyone so hung up on a repeat?"

The only thing that made Edward feel even marginally better was the firm belief that if anything had actually happened between Bella and Jasper, one of them undoubtedly would have told him. There was also a quite immature and petulant voice singing in the back of his head that he'd gotten there first. That probably was not the best line of thought to stick to.

It wasn't the first time Edward was flooded with guilt for being thankful that Emmett had decided to take summer classes again. The last thing he needed was Bella's brother coming home to find that one of his friends had decided to pursue his sister. It didn't matter that they weren't related by blood, and it never had. Emmett was fiercely protective, and trust was not easily won from him. It wasn't just the typical reactions that worried Edward—the part that was going to send Emmett into a fury was the deception, and Edward, at the very least, wanted a clearer idea of how he felt about Bella before getting his ass kicked over her.

Edward pushed the thought from his mind and suggested, "Maybe if you'd stop hanging all over her, people would stop getting the wrong idea."

Jasper glanced at him with an expression that was a bit too knowing for Edward's taste. "Fair point. So tell me, college-boy, how was Harvard?"

"Fine."

What Edward really wanted to say was that it was boring, stagnant, but he couldn't quite get the ungrateful and bitter sentiment to roll off his tongue. The truth was that he wasn't sure what he was doing there anymore. His whole life he'd worked so hard to get accepted. He'd had plans and goals and roadmaps all written out and laminated that took him years into the future. He used to find comfort in the rigidity of it. Now there was an ever growing part of him that wanted to set it all on fire just to watch it burn.

He envied the free-flow of Jasper's life. He was jealous of Bella, because she could throw her education away and come back home like it was nothing―but he thought that what probably bothered him the most was that it almost felt like lines were being drawn. Jasper and Bella versus Edward and Emmett―college versus freedom―and he wanted Bella on _his_ side, not Jasper's.

Mostly he was just pissed off because Bella was apparently able to act like nothing had ever happened between them, and he wasn't sure he could. It didn't matter that they'd agreed to let it go, to pretend; Edward wanted to know that his existence had some sort of effect on her beyond the realm of friendship and past the confines of three summer months a year and too few visits in between.

"Sounds lame," Jasper commented as he shifted gears and passed a car that was only going ten miles an hour over the speed limit compared to Jasper's fifteen. It was a wonder that Chief Swan hadn't thrown Jasper in jail yet. Actually, he wasn't so sure that he hadn't.

"What did she tell you? About why she came back?" It was a thinly veiled attempt to change the subject and an incredibly clumsy grab for additional information all rolled up into one―and Jasper saw right through it.

"Tsk, tsk. You know that's something you gotta ask her." It would be so much easier if that wasn't the case. Jasper always chose the most inopportune times to display loyalty.

"Where are we going?" It was the easiest question he could think of to ask next.

"Around. Why? You got somewhere you have to be?" Jasper laughed, and Edward rapped his knuckles against his friends shoulder.

"What if I do?"

"Then I would say that there's a first time for everything."

This was closer to normal. This was more what he'd been hoping to find back in Forks.

Jasper took the next right, faster than he should have, but that wasn't so unusual, and hit the accelerator to merge onto the highway. "How about anywhere but here? Is that too after school special? I can never tell."

"Yeah, that was pretty lame," Edward chuckled, resigned to being at the mercy of Jasper's whims. There was no telling where they might end up. It was kind of a nice feeling, and one that he'd never before learned to appreciate.

The scenery zoomed by accompanied by the harsh wind breezing through Jasper's open window, and Edward wondered if Bella had any of the thousand and one questions he'd been plagued by over the past few months thundering through her head, too.

#

Edward didn't expect Bella to seek him out, not right away, and he childishly wanted her to come to him. They hadn't had any time to navigate the things that had happened between them the last time he saw her. She'd made him promise that nothing would change. She made him swear up and down that when he came home from his second year of school he'd be the same Edward who came home from his first, and even then he'd known he was lying to her when he agreed. He never had been certain which part of it was deception and which was good old-fashioned denial. It was hard for him to form a hypothesis when he didn't know if things were going to be different because they hadn't ever known each other all that well before, and they did now; or if it was because some occurrences cause alterations that are simply unavoidable.

The first time he ran into her was entirely by chance, in the grocery store, and it was almost like a blow to the chest; if he hadn't turned his head at just the right time he would have missed her entirely. He hadn't realized she'd be so different, and yet still the same. Bella carried herself through the aisles like she had through the hallways of their high-school. She was set ever so slightly apart from everyone else.

Her hair looked longer, her body a little more curved. She tilted her head to the side by the slightest degree, just like she'd done countless times before, but there was a weariness present that he didn't think she'd ever displayed before. The only thing he was able to focus on was the small smile she had on her face as she scanned the shelves and dropped items into her shopping cart.

Edward hadn't realized how much he'd missed her. The frequency of communication between them ebbed and flowed along with factors like his exams and her work schedule, and every phone call was charged with tension. He wondered if it was something exclusive to the pair of them, or if it was a perfectly normal aftershock to sleeping with a girl when it was supposed to mean nothing.

Edward followed Bella to the next aisle, trying to figure out which of the hundred ways he could play this would work the best. He thought about sneaking up on her for a moment, but as soon as he decided to do it she turned toward him and startled. The smile on her face widened and shifted into something more meaningful than the soft smiles she gave to everyone else without consideration. It was as good as her telling him that she'd missed him, too; that late night phone calls that came far too infrequently hadn't been enough for her, either.

"Wow." Bella took a sharp breath and shook her head, as if to clear some errant thought away. "Hi."

It seemed distinctly to Edward's advantage to try to play it cool, so he took his time walking toward the center of the baking aisle and attempted to keep the smile on his face casual, befitting of a friendly reunion. "Not expecting to see me, huh?"

"No, no," Bella answered quickly, that same curious look on her face. He found it both disconcerting and beautiful. "I just… I knew you were coming home for break soon, but wasn't sure when."

"I probably should have called, huh?"

"Nah. I think that maybe this is one of those good surprises. Besides, you're not the only one who hasn't been calling as much as they probably should."

"Damn straight," Edward answered, finally cracking a smile of his own. He had no idea which of them had been worse at it. Conversation between them had always been inconsistent, but the past few months had been another story entirely. It was hard to get a handle on things when he couldn't even figure out if she was avoiding him.

"Sorry about that," Bella muttered, and she reached behind her to grab the handle of her shopping cart.

"How's Emmett been doing?" The question was awkward and filler, but he couldn't think of anything else to say that was even remotely appropriate for the setting. He didn't want her to brush him off so soon just because they opened a topic of conversation they obviously weren't ready for.

"He's good," Bella answered, sounding confused but more comfortable. "Don't you talk to him?"

"Yeah."

"When did you get back?" she asked before the conversation could lull.

"Two days ago," he answered, and then promptly threw the reason for his innocent question straight out the window in favor of what he really wanted to talk about, whether it was the right time or not. "Look, I―"

"We don't have to talk about it," Bella interrupted. She pressed her lips together and took a noticeably deep breath. "You don't have to worry about me making a big deal or anything, okay?"

Of all the ways Edward had imagined she might behave after the luxury of time and space, complete and total indifference hadn't even crossed his mind. It was a good thing, in a way, because it made him realize that when he'd considered all those reactions she might have, he hadn't ever thought about himself. Watching her now, he knew this wasn't something he was going to be able to let go as easily as he'd thought. Sure, the situation wasn't ideal, and it wasn't going to be easy, but the welling of curiosity he experienced standing there in the grocery store as he failed to dissect her words and actions into something that made sense to him wasn't exactly new territory.

It was a feeling he distinctly remembered from hours spent flung into each other's company last summer. Once he'd gotten a glimpse of who she was, whole and apart from everything else, he hadn't been able to leash the curiosity that ran rampant. It seemed some things never changed, and it became apparent to Edward that he was the one they had to worry about making a big deal of their night together. He really wasn't handling this all that well. He also felt like an asshole for how easy it was to dismiss Emmett entirely.

"Alright," Edward agreed with a slight nod.

"I'm glad you're home," Bella said after a moment, the words reminiscent of some sort of peace offering between the two of them. He knew her well enough to know what she really meant by it.

"I missed you, too."

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><p><strong>AN: Chapter 2 on Thursday 12/1.**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Beta'd by sweeneyanne and preread by aerobee82 and AlexisDanaan.**

**Thanks to everyone for the reviews, alerts, and favorites!**

**Make sure to note the date below - there's two independent timelines happening here, so time jumps abound (but they will never happen within a chapter).**

**Do not own Twilight.**

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><p><strong>June 6, 2010<strong>

It was not Edward's fault that he kept making an ass out of himself in front of Bella Swan. Absolutely not. There were extenuating circumstances, poor choices in company, and just plain bad luck working against him. On this occasion, the incredibly dangerous combination of Jasper and whiskey happened to be the culprit. Really, he should have known he was doomed to make a fool of himself from the very moment he'd spied Jasper's car pulling up his driveway. Jasper had an inherent ability to talk him into doing things he normally wouldn't.

Like this.

There was only one reason in the world he would be holding a drink in one hand and five cards in the other with the smallest stack of poker chips out of the four at the table. The next most reasonable article of clothing to give up was his pants, and he was absolutely not going to let that happen. This was all Jasper's fault. Jasper and his house rules and his particular way of drawling, "Oh, come on. Maybe you'll get to see some tits for once."

Getting schooled by his friend's little sister was not how Edward liked to spend his time. At least Bella seemed to have forgiven him for the previous weekend when he'd tried to dodge Jasper's attempt to trip him and wound up slamming her right into a wall. That kind of shit _never_ happened to him. Again, he blamed Jasper; it was obviously his fault.

This was the worst idea in the world, and what ratcheted it up from terrible to downright humiliating was that Bella was a sharp. He didn't know if it was him or her or maybe just that she really was that good at bluffing―but the more hands he lost to her and the more he sipped on his Jack and Coke, it became increasingly obvious that no, he wasn't going to get one stitch of clothing off the girl. From the look on her face she was entirely aware of his disappointment, too. Another reason this was Jasper's fault; Edward hadn't even thought about what was under her clothes until Jasper put the idea in his head.

Bella looked entirely too pleased with herself as she glanced at the pile of t-shirts, socks, and one ostentatious belt-buckle courtesy of Jasper himself sitting next to the out of play poker chips and an ancient Polaroid camera that she'd been taking pictures with all night. He was quickly learning that Bella got a kick out of these kinds of things. She laughed quietly to herself before glancing over at him from under her lashes, and upped the stakes with a sly smile on her face as she tapped her fingers on the table in a steady drum. He'd never gotten to see this side of her before, he'd hadn't spent any measure of time with her outside of the past year―since she moved in with her dad―and he'd dutifully abided by the label affixed to her forehead declaring that she was Emmett's sister, and therefore off-limits. It didn't matter that Bella and Emmett weren't technically related, or that she was a year younger than the rest of his social circle. That's just what she was. Until now.

Edward folded. There was no way in hell she was getting his pants.

Jasper called and cards got thrown down, and soon Jasper's undershirt joined the growing pile of fabric sitting to the side of a very smug Bella. Edward eyed the cards warily, took a sip of his drink, and glared to his left. He was pretty sure Jasper was letting Bella win, the traitor.

If someone had told Edward a month ago that he'd be spending a Thursday night in Jasper's nearly empty house playing cards with Bella Swan and Angela Weber, well, he would have told them they were out of their fucking minds. He'd never really known either of the girls outside of school until recently. In the absence of Emmett and Edward, it seemed Jasper had busied himself making new friends. He understood Bella, to an extent, but Angela had come out of left field. He'd tried to ask Jasper about it on the sly, but Jasper had only answered that Angela had decided to take a walk on the wild side. Edward supposed it was a natural side-effect of being the child of a minister.

Edward didn't have the slightest idea when in the world Jasper had befriended the two girls. He suspected it probably had something to do with Chief Swan, Jasper, public intoxication, and handcuffs. It wouldn't be the first time; last fall Jasper had used his one phone call on Edward, and asked him to bring soda to the police station to go with the pizza he'd convinced Bella to order. Back then Bella and Jasper had only gotten along when Jasper was trapped in an eight by ten cell and had to be at least a little nice. So maybe, that was where it had started―or maybe Jasper just didn't abide by that social construct that had always kept Bella so firmly on the edge of Edward's periphery until tonight. It wouldn't be the first time for that, either.

Bella took a sip of her soda and folded the next hand with a patronizing smirk across the table at Jasper. "Please. I'm not that stupid."

Edward followed her lead and pushed his hand toward the center of the table. She'd been kicking their asses all night; it would have been stupid to stay in.

"Where'd you learn to play Poker so well?" Jasper huffed, showing annoyance for the first time as he gathered up the abandoned cards and claimed the anted chips as his own. Bella picked up the Polaroid camera from the table and snapped a picture of Jasper's scowl.

"What do you think I did when I came to visit Charlie? Sit around the house with him and Emmett and paint their nails?" Bella laughed and brushed a wayward strand of hair behind her ear. "Charlie was always either working or fishing. Emmett was always with you. The guys at the station taught me while Charlie was on duty."

Edward couldn't help but smile at the small glimpse she allowed them of too short weeks spent with her father as a child. It wasn't something he could really explain, he just liked knowing things that not many others did. Something about it felt different with Bella. An errant thought occured that maybe it was because this was the first time he'd ever gotten to actually hang out with her without the burden of labels. Tonight she wasn't Emmett's little sister. She wasn't a classmate. She wasn't even really a friend. She was just Bella, and he was starting to regret not ever getting to know her before.

Somewhere in between drinks number five and fifteen Bella stood and stretched, and Edward couldn't quite help the way his eyes settled on her as she walked away from the table toward the hallway.

"See something you like?" Jasper asked quietly, with an all too knowing grin.

"Fuck off."

Jasper was far too good at spotting exactly what you didn't want him to see.

"Don't be so sensitive, it's a nice view."

Angela snickered from across the table and cocked an eyebrow at Edward's half-hearted glare. She was a fun girl; he could see how she and Bella were friends. What Edward didn't understand was why he hadn't ever _known_ they were friends until a few hours prior when the pair of them showed up on Jasper's doorstep―the only two people in town they could wrangle up for an impromptu party celebrating… well, they weren't really celebrating anything. They needed more friends. Emmett had always been the one who got along with everyone; Jasper and Edward were just along for the ride.

When Bella made her way back to the table she had a fedora resting on top of her head, like it was the most natural thing in the world, like that hat belonged on her head.

"How many times have I told you to stay out of my closet?" Jasper asked with not nearly enough irritation in his voice for anyone to take him seriously.

"It looks better on me than it does you."

Edward laughed, a little louder than he'd intended, at the scowl Jasper shot across the table before picking up the cards and shuffling through them. He'd had just enough to drink that it seemed like a marvelous idea to throw in his own two cents. "Sure does."

"You would think so," Jasper shot back.

The cards were suddenly so much more interesting.

Edward let out a breath of relief when Angela finally had mercy on the situation and asked Bella, "So, where's your brother? I thought he'd be strutting around in his cut-offs by now."

"Oh, he found himself some blonde surfer chick in Palo Alto. Apparently bros before hoes is conditional on the hoe," Jasper answered.

Bella picked a pretzel out of the bowl sitting to her left and flicked it at Jasper's face in retaliation. "You should be happy for him. He told me he's in love with her."

Jasper grunted in a way that meant he was feeling uncomfortable with the topic at hand; he never was any good with conversation once it inched anywhere near emotional. Edward considered drawing it out further for a moment but immediately changed his mind. Emmett and Jasper had one thing that had always connected them, and that was the death of their parents. Jasper had only been a baby when he lost his mother. When his father died he'd been older―nearly an adult―and no matter how poor his methods of coping were, he still managed. Meanwhile, Emmett had just been a kid when Chief Swan took custody of him, and the loss had hit much harder. Emmett and Jasper had both fought long and hard to make it past the events that stole away the people who loved them, or in Jasper's case, were supposed to. Jasper hadn't quite gotten to a place where he could give and take love freely yet, but it seemed Emmett had, and there wasn't anyone sitting at the table who didn't fully believe that Emmett deserved every single bit of happiness he could find.

"He's coming home soon, though, right?" Edward asked. He knew the answer already, but he was starting to feel the effects of too many drinks and couldn't think of anything else to say.

"Yeah, in a few weeks. Rosalie, his girlfriend, she's coming to meet Charlie at the end of the summer before they go back to school." Bella smiled and shook her head. "Never thought I'd see the day when Emmett brought a girl home to meet the Chief."

"Hey, now!" Angela laughed. "Have you forgotten those glorious ten days I dated him?"

"You already knew Charlie, that doesn't count."

"Sure it does," Angela argued. "I got the pleasure of being introduced as 'Er… Charlie, this is my… uh… my girlfriend…'"

The deep voice Angela had used to imitate Emmett's was even funnier than her description of how uncomfortable Emmett had been that day. Edward remembered it particularly well; the first chance Emmett got had seen him showing up at Edward's house shaking his head and insisting he was in way over his head. Emmett and Angela had broken up two days later; neither party seemed bothered by it. At the time Jasper had theorized that Angela was a lot like himself and Emmett, even if he wasn't sure why. She didn't seem like she was looking for anything serious.

While Emmett and Jasper had always made a conscious effort to never get attached, Edward was a bit more subtle. He'd dated, a little, in high-school; had hooked up with girls at parties and mixers at Harvard, but he'd never sought out a relationship. He told himself it wasn't the same as it was with Jasper and Emmett. His parents may not have spent all that much time together when he was growing up, but that was the price Carlisle paid for his job. Still, in the infrequent family dinners and nights out it was easy to see how much his parents loved each other.

Edward just hadn't met anyone who was interesting enough to make him want to work for it. Through the haze of alcohol and laughter he had an errant thought that whispered 'until now.'

Edward glanced to the right to see Bella biting her bottom lip in an attempt to stifle her laughter, and was surprised to realize that in the time he'd known her, Bella didn't seem all that interested in dating either. He wondered why that was.

Conversation seemed to lull as Angela took her turn to deal the cards; He couldn't explain the need he felt to keep it going. It was almost like if too much time went by without words then he wouldn't be able to control the intense desire he had to stare at Bella's profile and try to figure out the answers to all the questions he had swirling around in his increasingly foggy head.

"What are you studying at that fancy school of yours?" Angela asked as she raised the bet.

Bella folded and Edward called before answering, "I'm pre-med."

"Like Carlisle?" Angela asked with a small smile. He didn't think he'd ever become comfortable with the way the girls of Forks lusted after his father.

"Yeah, like Carlisle." The words left an almost bitter taste in his mouth, and he wondered why that was. There wasn't anything about this conversation that was off the mark. Maybe it was that he had a burning desire to define himself, and all that anyone ever seemed to be able to say about him was that he was just like his dad. He wasn't so sure anymore that attending Carlisle's alma mater to study his profession was the best way to set himself apart.

He didn't really want to talk about it. That grand idea of becoming a doctor just like his dad had lost some of its sheen over the past year. Faced with the reality of all it entailed had been like a bucket of cold water dumped over his head. Edward never really considered that he wouldn't find the medical profession all that exciting, but he didn't know what else to do.

He needed to change the subject, so he turned to Bella. "You're going to the University of Florida, right?"

Edward wasn't even entirely sure how he knew that tidbit of information. It must have been something Emmett had told him and just stuck.

"I suppose I am," Bella answered. She didn't sound very enthusiastic about it, so he refrained from asking the fifty other questions floating through his head.

He wondered what she was going to major in, if she'd even decided yet. He wanted to know if she was going to live in the dorms, if she'd talked to her roommate yet. He wanted to know what classes she was taking and which ones she was most excited for. He couldn't remember ever wanting to ask so many questions in his life. He wanted so badly to know if she was planning on completing her degree there, or if the University of Florida was a college chosen because her mother lived nearby, and she had hopes of completing her education elsewhere. He didn't even try to pretend that he wasn't thinking of just how well she'd fit in at Harvard. He could think of six girls that lived in his dormitory that she would get along with.

An hour later Edward was sure he had Bella at his mercy with three tens; he wound up giving up his pants.

"Why the hell are we playing this game again?" he grumbled before shooting an accusatory glare in Jasper's direction as Bella pushed another stack of chips in his direction with a smirk on her face. It was almost worth the humiliation of being the first to lose their pants when Bella didn't quite tear her gaze away from his lap before he caught her. At least that was encouraging, but a split-second later he shook his head once and remembered that he wasn't supposed to be thinking these things about the pretty girl to his right.

"Because Jasper's a pervert, and we couldn't find the Twister spinner." Bella rolled her eyes. The gesture would have been more convincing if she hadn't also been smiling. "Too bad he didn't realize that Angela and I are the best poker players at the table. Perhaps he should have been angling for strip-Go Fish."

"Shut up," Jasper grumbled.

"Yes, dear." Bella was having entirely too much fun with this.

It was colossally unfair that she was so damn attractive when she got that teasing smirk on her face. It was something he wanted to see more often. Edward kind of wanted her to keep winning. He definitely wanted to watch her beat Jasper into the ground, and he figured that was as good a reason as any to keep playing.

It was well past two in the morning by the time the final hand was dealt. Along the way the chips had evened out somewhat; Edward figured it was because once the booze caught up to Angela, Bella lost interest. Or maybe it was just that she decided to have mercy on them. It didn't matter which to him, though Jasper was obviously disappointed that his master plan of getting them out of their bras had failed. Not that something so simple would stop Jasper; the moment he escalated his flirtation with Angela was the moment Edward was ready to leave the room.

He snatched his clothes from the table and pulled his t-shirt over his head before heading through the living room toward the stairs. There was a ridiculously comfortable bed at the end of the hallway upstairs, and it had his drunk ass's name on it.

Bella followed a few moments afterward, and he stopped between two doors that opened into the guest bedrooms―formerly a study and Jasper's parent's room―and inhibition escaped him long enough to tell her, "I can't believe I've never hung out with you before."

He felt like a moron.

"We've hung out before." Bella laughed. She leaned against the hallway wall and tilted her head. "But not quite like this, I think."

"No, not like this." He didn't know why it felt so different. He was irrationally pissed that Emmett's sister couldn't have been boring or obnoxious.

"It was fun, even if you did wind up mostly naked. Or maybe more so… I'm having trouble deciding." Bella fiddled with a black piece of fabric in her hand as she spoke. It took him a moment to realize it was Jasper's shirt.

"You're taking that as payment?"

"Pajamas." She smiled at him again, and he knew it couldn't possibly be a good thing that their conversation felt so easy, yet charged with something he couldn't identify.

"I'm sure he won't miss it."

"Oh, you know Jasper. He'll probably thank me in the morning for ensuring he didn't have to flirt fully clothed. I'm pretty sure he was playing to lose anyway."

"Look at you, helping Jasper try to get laid," Edward laughed at the blush that spread over her cheeks. "Were you supposed to be his wingman tonight?"

"Not quite," Bella answered, but he caught her cringe and the way she avoided looking at him for a moment. Why couldn't he have figured out she did that earlier? Poker would have been much less of a train wreck.

"Angela?" he guessed. Bella huffed and Edward knew he was right. "She is aware that she doesn't _need_ a wingman with Jasper, right?"

"Oh, it wasn't like that! I think she was just curious about him."

Edward was about to tease her again when she covered her mouth and yawned, and he realized just how tired he was. It probably wasn't a good idea to be talking so plainly with her when he was feeling so distinctly uninhibited. His track record with Bella was littered with embarrassment and mishaps as it was. He had no idea when he started caring so much about impressing her. It had to be somewhere between the time he spilled soda down the back of her shirt and the time he told her that he loved Boston, only to have her give him a look that clearly said she thought he was a moron and ask, 'But isn't Harvard in Cambridge?'

"I think I need to pass out before I make an ass out of myself again," he muttered to himself. Too loudly, obvious by Bella's snickering.

"Hey, you only knocked over the pretzels once tonight, don't sell yourself short."

Fuck, he'd forgotten about that.

"It's actually kind of nice," Bella continued, barely stifling her laughter. She was beautiful when she smiled. "Usually I'm the klutzy one making messes all over the place."

"I swear, I'm usually not such an idiot."

"Go to bed you little lush." Bella grinned before standing on her toes to ruffle his hair. "I promise you'll be smarter in the morning."

She smiled again as she passed him to head toward a room further down the hall. When he pushed his door open she called out to him, and he turned to see a curious expression on her face.

"Yeah?" He was momentarily blinded by the flash of her camera.

"It was good to see you again."

He couldn't be sure, but he thought the dark flowing hair and soft smile in his dreams that night might have been hers.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Chapter 3 on Sunday, 12/4. A teaser will go up on my blog at some point.**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Beta'd by sweeneyanne and preread by aerobee82 & AlexisDanaan. Much love to them and to all of you. :-)**

**Don't own Twilight.**

* * *

><p><strong><span>June 02, 2011<span>**

Edward would forever think of the high school bleachers as somewhere that reeked of his friendships with Jasper and Emmett. They'd laughed and argued there, hid underneath them taking swigs from a pint of whisky when Jasper got his first fake I.D.; they'd sat on the very top tier the day Emmett bragged that he'd gotten into Stanford, and again when Edward got his acceptance letter from Harvard.

Edward could have driven around town; he could have gone to Jasper's, or to one of the other dozen places in Forks he frequented when he needed to get out of his house—but the thrumming of his car engine was more conducive to calm deliberation rather than the tense analysis he wanted to make of his situation. Jasper's house was too much like a powder keg, just waiting for that one last straw to break Jasper and see him burning the whole place to the ground; it was good for a party, but that was only because with enough people around Jasper didn't think so much about how much he hated living there.

He was left with the bleachers, and if he were to have thought about it from a more optimistic angle, he probably would have chosen to go there anyway. It seemed fitting; he was at the end of his rope and nearly out of his mind, and once he decided to go to the only place in Forks where he could actually think, he found Bella sitting on the bottom level staring out at the football field.

He'd hardly seen her at all in the past two weeks. Just glimpses here and there at the store or the park, or when they were both hanging out with Jasper. He had the feeling she was avoiding him.

Edward had many problems with the possibility that Bella was trying to keep out of his line of sight, but the most prevalent was that he had grown fond of her company—even in the most basic terms of friendship—and he had missed her. He hadn't spent any reasonable measure of time with her in months, but he could recall with perfect clarity the look she'd get on her face when her hair started tangling at the end of the day and she had to put it up, or how if she found something particularly hilarious her laugh would transform into something loud, obnoxious, and absolutely infectious. She and Jasper were practically soldered together, but during the few times where he'd found himself alone with her he could swear the air felt different—both then, and now.

He remembered all too vividly what it had felt like to have her in his bed, and the experience was completely unique. It wasn't like it was with other girls—not that he could have said that definitively. The only comparisons he could make had taken place during his freshman year. For some reason he just couldn't work up the desire to date or even pick up a girl after meeting Bella. It seemed pointless. The one time he tried he'd spent the entire night comparing them, and once he'd determined the thirty-second thing about Bella that was far superior to the bland redhead he'd spontaneously asked out, he'd called it a night.

He could not get the smell of her shampoo or the sight of her pulling his t-shirt over her head out of his mind. He couldn't stop thinking about any of it, but he couldn't bring himself to let it bother him, either. Above all Edward prided himself on being rational, even when he was acting like a lunatic. He didn't care that no one could live up to Bella, because he didn't feel like things between them were over. They were on hiatus. They were at an impasse.

This was the first time he'd encountered Bella in a semi-private setting since he'd been home, and he was going to take advantage of it. He'd spotted her truck in the parking lot, which meant she was probably alone; Jasper always insisted on driving, and he refused to get behind the wheel of that monster.

Bella stilled her fidgeting when she caught sight of him, and he watched with a vague sort of amusement when she bit her bottom lip and pushed her shoulders back a bit. He liked watching all of her tells that he'd spent hours picking out of her behavior last summer. She didn't scoot away when he sat just a little too close to her, and if nothing else, that was promising.

"This is about the last place I expected to find you."

"I was kind of looking for you," Bella said quietly. Her smile was cautious, but it was still there. "You know, in that sort of unconscious way where everywhere I wind up is somewhere you might be."

"Any reason in particular?" Edward asked, and she shook her head.

"I think I just wanted to see you."

"Then all you had to do was stop avoiding me." Edward's bitterness seeped through in his tone. He felt bad for it, but he was tired of trying to figure out what he'd done wrong, when he'd done everything she'd asked him to.

Last summer they'd spent a lot of time together, both with other company and without. She'd spent hours in the kitchen with his mom baking, and had, on more than one occasion spent the entire day surrounded by the books in his bedroom. Now there was a cautious distance between them, and he didn't like it. It was like she was determined to ensure they had a chaperone at all times. In truth, he'd started to worry that there was a part of her that hated him for not stopping them in their tracks the night all the attraction and tension laced between them finally snapped.

Bella sighed, her gaze steady on the expanse of grass in front of them. "I'm sorry about that."

"So…" Edward started, and he snuck a glance to his right at Bella's profile.

"I don't want things to be weird between us."

"Then let's just not let it be weird." Edward shrugged his shoulders. It was the only solution he could come up with.

"Do you think it's really that easy?" Bella wondered, and he reached over to grab one of her hands in his. It wasn't the first time he marveled over how well they fit together.

"Bella, first and foremost we are friends, okay? Nothing that went down is going to change that, not unless you let it." She squeezed her fingers around his palm and glanced his way before letting go. The silence that stretched between them and through the bleachers felt charged, and Edward didn't know what else he could possibly say to make things better between them.

"Yeah, you're right." Bella nodded firmly and when she looked at him again she seemed more at ease. "So, what have you been up to?"

"Really?" Edward laughed. "That's your segue?"

"Shut up." Bella grumbled and knocked her shoulder against his. It felt good to be back in a space where they could tease each other, even if it wasn't really where he wanted to be. Even if she was so obviously trying to pretend until she could get herself to a place where she didn't have to anymore. "I couldn't think of anything deeply insightful. You get what you get."

"My dad wants me to work at his practice next summer." He hadn't told anyone else about the offer, hadn't even discussed it with his mother yet. He didn't know why he was telling Bella now. It just felt right to. She would understand the way his phrasing meant he wasn't sure about this path he was on anymore, and he knew that no matter what he said about it she wasn't going to try to push him in either direction. She wasn't going to judge him if he said he might not take the opportunity.

"You don't sound very happy about it." Her brow wrinkled as she stared at him. It felt like she was trying to figure out the puzzle of him with as few clues as possible.

"I don't know if I want to take it or not. It seems like… if I do this it's buckling myself in for the ride," he answered with a shrug that was meant to reassure himself more than her. It was easier to think about if he could at least pretend to have some perspective. "I've had this plan in place for so long. I wanted to go to medical school, become a doctor, be just like my dad—but then you started talking about how it all hit you, that you weren't sure you even knew who you were, much less who you wanted to be—and you're right. I don't know. I've been doing nothing but clinging to someone else's dream.

"If I take this internship, then this is what I'm going to be. This is what I'm going to do with my life, and I'm not so sure it's what I want anymore." They were fears and uncertainties that he'd never spoken about before, and it felt good to finally say it out loud; to admit that he had doubts.

"So don't take it." Bella shrugged. "It's not like he wouldn't let you do it the next year or something. This is your dad we're talking about, not some hotshot doctor you have to worry about not insulting by saying no. Just tell him you're not set on your major yet. Or say you want to enjoy the free summers while you still can, 'cause once you get to med school that's all gonna fly right out the window."

"You make it sound so simple."

"That's because I'm smarter than you."

"You wish."

"How is Boston, by the way?" she teased.

Edward rolled his eyes. He was never going to live that one down. "Lovely."

Bella chuckled to herself for a moment before turning the conversation toward more serious topics. "Why did you come here?"

"This is where I usually go when I need to think." Edward could have given her more of an explanation, but he didn't feel the need to.

"Lots of hard choices rolling around in that brain of yours?" Her voice was light, teasing, but from the look on her face he knew that she understood that this was probably the case. He wondered if she realized just how many of those choices had to do with her.

"Pretty much." And he really didn't want to talk about it anymore, so he redirected the spotlight somewhere he knew it would stick for a while. "Where's Jasper?"

"With Alice," Bella answered, clearly displeased.

The only thing about her response that surprised him was that it had taken over two weeks for him to go crawling back this time. It had to have been a record. "That sure didn't take long. What happened this time?"

"She spread her legs."

"Oh, don't be so bitter," Edward said after a moment, elbowing her side. "You still got me. How many times have they broken up since I was last home?"

"Christ, like five, at least." Bella scoffed. "It's ridiculous. I have no idea what he sees in her."

Edward didn't want to be the one to tell her that Jasper seemed to actually have some pretty strong feelings for the girl, even if he did have problems with expressing them. Instead, he evaded by saying, "For a while there I thought the two of you were getting along."

"Not really," Bella answered. "We were tolerating each other. For a while."

"What happened?" Edward asked. He'd always been curious about the sudden onset of animosity between the two girls. They shared some mutual friends, and he'd always assumed they'd simply had some falling out at some point between when he left high school and Alice started dating Jasper. It seemed worse now. In the past Bella had always tried to keep a somewhat civil tone when referring to Jasper's girlfriend, no matter if they were together or broken up. He'd never been able to get the whole story out of her.

"She thinks I slept with Jasper." Bella punctuated her answer with a huff and over-dramatic eye-roll.

He couldn't help it, he laughed at her. It wasn't so much that it was funny, just that he was pretty sure that _everyone_ had made that exact same assumption at one point or another. Bella glared at him, and before he could even think to block the hit she swung her fist sideways and clipped him on the shoulder. He would never admit it, but the girl sure knew how to throw a punch.

"I _didn't_."

"I _know_," Edward shot back, just as indignant. "Believe me; Jasper would never have been able to shut up about it."

Bella stared at him for a moment, before nodding. "You're right. He would have been bragging all over town, at least until Emmett showed up."

She laughed at the end of her assessment, and Edward couldn't keep himself from doing the same, albeit more nervously. He hated the perpetual reminders of how poorly Emmett was likely to take the news of a relationship between his little sister and one of his friends. Equally as frightening was the prospect of Bella's gun-toting, Police Chief of a father, and Edward muttered, "Or until Charlie shot him."

"Anyway," Bella continued with a huff, "I've tried explaining things to her. Jasper's tried. She never really liked me all that much in the first place so really there's no point. From what I gather she's been carrying a torch for Jasper for years, and apparently it was rude of me to sweep in and befriend him or something. God, girls are so stupid sometimes."

He chuckled at her tirade, and resolved to not point out the fact that she'd been doing some stupid girl things of her own lately.

"Speak of the devil," Bella muttered, nodding toward the north end of the field where Jasper and Alice had come into view. "This should be fun."

"Just ignore her," Edward advised.

"Should be easy. I'll bet you twenty dollars she doesn't even say hello to me."

"I think I'm going to pass on that one." One of the first things he learned about Bella was to never bet against her.

"Can't blame me for trying."

"Just who I was hoping to find," Jasper declared, sweeping away the privacy Edward had been enjoying so much. "What are you kids up to?"

"Not much," Bella answered. "Discussing the nature of the world, the meaning of life, crazy shit like that."

Jasper shook his head. "Not sorry I missed that conversation."

Edward felt distinctly out of place in the middle of Jasper and Bella's easy banter. He almost wished for the simpler times of the previous summer, but one glance in Bella's direction was enough to wash the wanting away. He'd wavered so much. He'd hemmed and hawed and convinced himself of so many things that were nothing but lies and misdirection. Now that he was firmly on the other side of that line he'd been so determined not to cross—no matter how precarious his position might be—he couldn't fathom doing anything other than fight to stay there.

The key was to remember that he nearly had himself sorted out; all that was left was her.

"Did you see those pictures Emmett sent the other day? Holy hell. Wish I was down in Palo Alta," Jasper asked, continuing a conversation Edward had stopped paying attention to in favor of his own musings.

"For the shrimp and sake, right?" Bella laughed.

"Fuck yes," Jasper barked, and the pair of them dissolved into snickers over what Edward could only assume was a stupid and irrelevant joke between them.

Edward didn't get it. From the looks of it Alice didn't either. She was tucked under Jasper's arm, the perfect representation of clingy girlfriend with her hand splayed over his chest and arm around his waist. She looked more and more irritated with each passing second.

Edward used to wonder what it was about Alice that kept Jasper around but somewhere along the line he'd realized that the fronts they put up for the world to see weren't necessarily who they were when they were together. He caught glimpses, sometimes, of a more caring Jasper and more understanding Alice. When they thought no one else could see they were actually quite sweet to each other. It was the way they acted when others were looking that caused all their problems; Jasper liked to act out, and Alice liked to over-react.

"We're going to a movie. You kids wanna come along?" Jasper asked, apparently oblivious to how unhappy Alice was at the prospect of sharing her boyfriend.

"Depends on the movie," Bella answered. Edward was impressed with her ability to pretend there wasn't a death stare trained on her. He thought that Jasper was probably doing the same, because Jasper may have little to no idea how to keep Alice happy, but that didn't mean he was a moron. He'd always been much better than this at picking up on people's moods—he had to be ignoring her discomfort on purpose.

"I dunno, some romantic comedy bullshit." Jasper rolled his eyes, and Alice's scowl somehow became even more apparent. Edward wondered how long it had taken her to master the expression. Knowing her, she probably practiced in front of a mirror until it was perfect.

"Pa-ass," Bella sang before looking to Edward. "Unless you're into that sort of thing?"

"God, no." He wondered how rude it would be to shoo Jasper and Alice away. They apparently had somewhere to be anyway.

Alice seemed to have the same idea. She gently tugged on Jasper's arm in the direction of the parking lot, but Jasper held his ground.

"You should call Angela sometime," Jasper suggested. He tilted his head, and if Edward hadn't known Jasper for so many years he would have missed the cue. Alice pressed her lips together into an even thinner line, and Edward had no idea what all that was about, but he was sure Jasper was going against the grain in some way.

Bella appraised Jasper for a moment, and she seemed almost disappointed when she agreed, "I will."

Edward wanted to know what that was all about.

Bella waited until Jasper's car had pulled out of the parking lot before standing. "I think I'm going to head home."

"Okay." He felt like he'd gotten somewhere, and he wasn't sure what direction he'd managed to take a few steps in, or if he was any closer to getting to a point where he could figure out exactly what it was he wanted to get out of this whole thing—but he'd achieved something, and for now that was enough. He didn't want to push her any harder than was necessary.

"Call me?" Bella asked, and he smiled at the request and nodded.

Edward stood when she did, and without giving him time to reconsider the action he pulled her into a brief hug. What he really wanted to do was kiss her, but he knew it would be too much.

He'd been watching her walk away far too much lately.

It was irksome that he had come here to be alone, and now all he could do was wish that he wasn't. He stared out at the unkempt field and allowed his mind to wander. There was something about this place—something in the sea of green contrasting against the cold, hard metal of the bleachers that spoke to him. All the biggest events of his life had been celebrated right here, and he wondered if this was another of those moments. If the draw he'd felt to football field was some dark corner of his head trying to make him see that change was on the horizon.

A year ago he would have welcomed the notion, but that was the young and naive part of him that was slowly but surely dissipating with each passing day and the choices that came with them. It was time to grow—to make decisions that were going to affect the rest of his life—but the only clear image in the future he wanted was Bella. He felt so childish, being this wound up over a girl.

It might be helpful if he had an impartial party he could talk to about everything, but as soon as it occurred to him he dismissed the thought. He wasn't the type of person who needed to hash out everything verbally. He preferred to mull issues over in his own time.

He analyzed every moment of their conversation. He thought over every touch and how she'd reacted to each one. He thought about the stupid joke Bella and Jasper had shared, and was loathe to admit the stirring in the pit of his belly couldn't be anything other than jealousy. Jasper was not competition, not in any tangible way—but still Edward disliked that it wasn't him Bella had spent all year running around with. It wasn't him who'd been there for her when she needed to feel safe and steady; his actions had probably done nothing but rock the boat harder.

It was ridiculous and petty, and he was resolved to not let it bother him anymore. Jasper could spout off all he wanted about all the shit he and Bella got up to while he was gone. They could have their inside jokes and strange expressions that only meant anything to them, and it would be just fine. Because he said so. Because he was determined.

Because he had a little piece of her that Jasper wasn't ever going to get.

A low beep sounded from his pocket, and he knew it was Bella before he even pulled his phone out. She always had something to say after all the rest was done.

'_It's weird because it's not.'_

He couldn't have put it better if he tried. He thumbed his response and deleted it twice wrapped in the haze of all he wanted to say to her. He typed the words for the third time and once the reply was sent he turned the volume down on his phone and shoved it back in his pocket where he could pretend he wasn't holding his breath waiting for her answer.

'_It's weird becaus__e I don't want to go back to how things were._'

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><p><strong>AN: Chapter 4 on Thursday 12/8. If you'd like a teaser, you'll be able to find it on my blog tomorrow...ish.**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Beta'd by sweeneyanne and preread by aerobee82 & AlexisDanaan. Check out the lovely fics these ladies are writing. :-)**

**Thanks to everyone for reading and reviewing!**

**Don't own Twilight.**

* * *

><p><strong>June 18, 2010<strong>

"I don't know what you think you're going to accomplish," Jasper shouted from a few yards back. "That girl is hopeless. She doesn't have a chance in hell at getting this right."

A frustrated sound—almost a growl—came tearing out of Bella's throat, and Edward laughed for what had to have been the tenth time in the past hour. Jasper was right; Bella had little to no aptitude for anything even remotely athletic. The fact that the activity she was failing miserably at was something as simple as skipping stones only added to the hilarity of the situation.

It was a nice change of pace from the typical Forks summers.

It hadn't taken long for Edward to realize that he liked having Bella around. She was kind and funny, she was smart, and she could hold her own against Jasper, which was no small feat. There was also the added bonus that she was quite nice to look at, and Edward found that he couldn't deny he was struggling to repress a bit of a crush on her. She was the kind of easy-going girl that he never really believed existed. Bella didn't care about stupid shit like fashion or if her hair looked nice. During the few times they'd found themselves alone together conversation had been easy, if a little strained. He liked her more than he should, that he was sure of, but he was also convinced that the best thing to do was to just leave it alone.

Lusting over Emmett's sister was the last thing in the world he should be doing. There was the added complication that he couldn't figure out what exactly Jasper's angle was, though he knew his friend well enough to be reasonably sure that if Jasper was after more than friendship with Bella, he would have said something by now.

It was becoming increasingly difficult for Edward to hold onto his resolve when Bella was standing just a few inches in front of him and practically chucking rocks into the water. She really was hopeless.

"You have to more… fling it," he said. Edward pulled his arm back and showed her the proper way again, not bothering to step away. It was easier for her to see the motion if she was closer. It was incredibly difficult to delude himself into believing that he wasn't trying to come on to her, just a little bit, but he managed.

"This is by far the stupidest thing I have ever been subjected to in my life." Bella shook her head, and when Edward took a breath, he was assaulted by the scent of her shampoo. It was something fruity and tangy, and it smelled far too good.

"Hey, now. You're the one who wanted to learn."

"That was _before_ I realized it was _impossible_."

"It's not impossible, you just _suck_ at it," Jasper snarked.

Edward was enjoying himself. It was nice to finally be able to show off a little, even if was at something as simple as skipping stones. It went a little way towards making up for the embarrassment of what he had taken to referring to as the 'poker incident'. He rolled his eyes and wondered when in the hell he'd decided he wanted to impress this girl, and why he hadn't come up with a better plan for it.

"I bet you can't do it either; if you could you'd already be over here showing off," Bella shot back, turning her head to arch a challenging eyebrow at Jasper. Edward added the gesture to the list of things he wanted to know the story behind; he had a feeling she'd gotten that expression from Charlie.

"She's got you pegged, Whitlock," Edward razzed.

"You sure you want to play this game with me, Cullen?" Jasper asked once Bella's focus shifted back to the lake, nodding toward the way Edward was still standing closer than necessary to her.

Edward took an automatic step back and glared Jasper's way only to be met with an eyebrow arched in amusement.

"Whatever pissing match the two of you have going on, can you wrap it up sometime soon?" Bella asked as she lobbed the stone she'd been holding into the water.

"Better." Edward nodded.

"Not really." Bella scrunched up her face and glared out at the lake. She crossed her arms and tapped her foot, and Edward errantly thought that he'd never seen anything quite so adorable in his life.

"Alright, kiddos. Sorry to break up this incredibly exciting display of how to throw a rock, but I got places to be," Jasper interrupted. "You need a ride home, Bella?"

Bella pressed her lips together instead of answering and continued staring out at the water.

"I'll take you later, if you want," Edward offered. She let out the breath she'd been holding and nodded, then turned to shoot a smile in Jasper's direction. He was sure it was the first time he'd ever picked up on a nonverbal cue correctly.

"Nope. Where you heading off to?"

"Places to go, people to see, you know how it is," Jasper answered before grinning back and heading toward his car, a final wave thrown over his shoulder for good measure.

It was quite the impressive evasion. Edward hadn't cared at all about where Jasper was going; they weren't the types to pry into each other's business—but Jasper had been acting weird all day, and Edward was starting to get suspicious. It made no sense for Jasper to call him up and practically demand his presence at the lake, and then bail less than an hour later.

Bella threw another stone into the water. She really was getting better—that one at least had some distance on it.

"Why don't you want to go home?" Edward asked.

"Charlie's working late and it's… I don't know. It's boring there."

"Don't you have any other friends?" He didn't mean for the question to sound quite so callous, but Bella seemed to understand his intent.

"I'm not one of those people who have to constantly be surrounded. I'd rather the people in my life mean something."

"I agree with you there." Edward had never seen the point in fair-weather friends. "So it's just been you and Jasper all year?"

"Pretty much," Bella answered as she crouched to look for another flat stone. "Angela, too, sometimes."

"What's up with him?" Edward wondered.

"He's seeing this girl from my class, Alice Brandon. He thinks I don't know about it."

Edward was surprised to get such a quick and direct answer from her, but what was even more interesting was the slight undertone of venom lacing her words. He couldn't fathom what that was all about.

He decided to try to be subtle. "I don't think I know her."

"I'm sure you do," Bella answered. "She's not easy to miss. She's friends with Jessica and Angela—Ang is definitely the cream of that crop. Jess isn't so bad actually… God, I sound like such a bitch right now."

"Not really." He actually found it quite funny. "What's your problem with this Alice girl?"

"Oh, no," Bella insisted. "I do not have any problem with Alice. She's the one with the problem. I have no idea what the hell she thinks I did to her, but I assure you that it's all in her head."

"And Jasper's dating her? Seems like a shitty thing to do."

"I don't think he grasps the entirety of the situation."

"Why don't you say something?" Edward wondered, glancing toward Bella curiously before returning his gaze to the ground to search out another suitably flat stone.

"Because I'm not going to mess this up for him," Bella answered. She gave him a stern look, like she was daring him to argue with her logic. "He obviously likes her, and he's a good judge of character. If she's really as bitchy as she acts toward me then he'll see it, and if she's not… well, then maybe I'm the one who missed something along the line."

"Plus, knowing Jasper, he'll probably mess it up all on his own."

Bella smacked his arm, but she was smiling. "That's a terrible thing to say about your friend!"

"You know it's true!"

"Okay… maybe," she conceded. "But don't you dare tell him I said so."

"I give them two weeks." He might have been imagining the sparkle in her eye, but he didn't think so. It wasn't the type of thing he usually noticed.

"Aw, I say at least the summer. Gotta root for the teenagers in like."

"Fan of the underdog?" Edward asked, and Bella nodded. He had to stop finding all these little things about her that he liked. Keeping himself in check would be so much easier if she was just some pretty girl that he couldn't have—but no, she had to be funny and interesting, too. He was so screwed.

"You're more fun than I assumed you were," Bella commented, as if it were a perfectly normal thing to say out of the blue.

"Um… thanks?" He wasn't sure how he was supposed to take that. "You're not quite what I expected either."

"What did you expect?" Bella wrinkled her nose as she asked. It was kind of adorable.

"I don't know. I just… I guess I thought I knew you well enough already."

He felt suddenly awkward now that they were all alone, and he searched for something for them to talk about. Bella turned her body back toward the lake and took a step backward. "Show me again."

She made him uncomfortable, but in a way that felt more exciting than anything else. He'd never been very good with girls, though he'd always thought of himself as someone who could hold his own. Bella was making him re-evaluate that theory. He flung what had to have been his twentieth stone into the lake. She shook her head when it skipped three times along the water. "Nice one."

"It's weird not having Emmett around," Edward blurted out. It was a desperate attempt to force himself to remember why Bella wasn't usually so present during his summers, but the reminder only cooled him a fraction of what he hoped.

"He'll be back in a month," Bella shrugged. Edward thought that she was trying to play it off. "I'm excited to meet Rosalie, actually."

"What have you heard about her?" Edward wondered. All he'd heard was 'blonde' and 'tits', and maybe something about smart, but he couldn't be sure. Emmett had been in full on bragging mode every time he'd talked to him about Rosalie.

"He said she's pretty laid back. She's studying… shit, something to do with computers?"

They'd stopped using the pretence of skipping stones entirely and with one more glare aimed out over the expanse Bella declared that she officially gave up and started walking toward his car at a slow pace. It only took him a few strides to catch up with her.

"Can I drive?" Bella asked as she watched him fish his keychain out of his pocket.

"Absolutely not," he answered, and he swung his keys from the tip of his fingers.

"I take it back. You're no fun at all."

"Just get in the car."

"Yes sir," she mocked with a little smirk on her face, and he made sure to mutter 'smart ass' just loud enough that he could be sure she heard it.

Bella was turning out to be much more fun than he'd assumed, too.

"Where are we going?" she asked when he turned over the engine, and Edward realized that he didn't actually have any destination in mind. After a moment he decided, "My place. We're going to my place."

"Oh, exciting." It sounded like she was teasing him.

"There something wrong with my house?"

"Not at all," she answered. He could almost hear her smiling.

"Good, because unless you have another idea, that's all I've got."

"We are such boring people," Bella lamented, entirely too over-the-top.

"That's not such a bad thing. At least we're easily amused."

She nodded, and Edward kept his attention focused on the road as he navigated the back roads toward his house. He couldn't remember if she'd ever been there before.

"When did you know you wanted to be a doctor?" Bella asked. He glanced over to see her staring out the passenger side window and her fingers tapping out a little rhythm against her thighs.

"Honestly? I think that maybe I just assumed it's what I should do. I never really thought about it too much until last fall." He'd never admitted that to anyone.

"And now that you're thinking about it?" Bella prodded as she turned in her seat to watch his answer.

"I'm not so sure anymore, but I don't have any better ideas."

"You're just going to keep going?" Bella asked, and Edward nodded. He was determined not to give up unless he had a perfectly legitimate reason for it.

"The classes I'm taking will count for something, even if I change my mind later. There's no point in switching my major right now." He wouldn't ever admit it, but it was kind of nice to be able to talk about this stuff with someone who didn't really grasp all he'd done to ensure he would wind up on the track he was starting to think might not be for him.

"What are you going to study?" he asked.

"Aquatic micro-biology with a focus on crustaceans."

"Really?" That was surprising given that when they arrived at the lake she'd wrinkled her nose and refused to go wading in the water with Jasper.

"No." Bella laughed. "I have no idea what that even means, it just sounds good. I have the feeling I'm going to be undeclared for a while."

Edward hadn't had all that much time to learn her little quirks and mannerisms, but he got the impression that this wasn't something she really wanted to talk about. He didn't know Bella well enough to push the subject, and was thankfully prevented from trying anyway by the sight of his driveway.

The moment they walked through the front door, he realized that bringing Bella to his house might not have been the best idea he'd ever had. He'd forgotten his mother would be home. One of Esme's many talents was her ability to embarrass him in less than a minute, and she utilized the ability at the most unexpected moments. He briefly considered herding Bella up the stairs before his mother had a chance to catch sight of them, but the sound of footsteps traveling the short hall separating them from the kitchen told him it was far too late for that.

"Wow," Bella breathed. "Your house smells _awesome_."

"Oh, this one's a keeper, Edward," Esme said as she turned the corner from the kitchen. He had to give his mother credit; she only paused for a moment when she realized who it was in her foyer. "My, my, Bella Swan. I haven't seen you in years."

Bella accepted Esme's hug graciously, and the look she shot Edward was only half as uncomfortable as he thought it would have been. Esme was a hugger; not everyone appreciated it. Esme cocked a knowing eyebrow in his direction as she released Bella, and he resigned himself to having what was sure to be an embarrassing conversation with his mother. Every time Esme saw even the slightest possibility of Edward acquiring a girlfriend she saw fit to give him 'the talk' in the most creative fashion she could come up with. Edward still felt traumatized from the last time.

"I don't know what in the world you have going on in that kitchen, but it smells wonderful," Bella sighed. She closed her eyes and took another deep breath, and Edward nearly choked trying to contain his laughter at the look of delight on Esme's face.

"I'm going to have to talk to your father about trading offspring, I think."

"I love you, too, mom." Edward interjected.

"Ah, but you never compliment my cooking." Esme squeezed his shoulder as she passed him on the way back to the kitchen. "Dinner's in an hour or so. Bella, you're welcome to stay."

"Oh, just try and stop me," Bella answered before turning to follow Edward down the hallway with a grin on her face.

He felt self-conscious having her in his room. There hadn't been a girl in there since his senior year of high-school when Jessica Stanley had let him under her shirt. He hadn't given two shits what Jessica thought of him, and to be fair the feeling was mutual. They were just two teenagers getting a few first experiences out of the way. This was different. He felt an irrational need to impress Bella.

He sat at the foot of his bed and watched as she stood in front of his bookshelf poking through the covers and examining the clutter on top of his dresser. It was like she was trying to determine as much as she could about him through his possessions alone. It wouldn't have felt so disconcerting if she was completely silent while she did it. Finally, after nearly ten minutes, she asked, "Where is your music?"

"You're judging me, aren't you?"

"Only a little," Bella winked, and he pointed toward the stereo where his iPod was docked. Instead of going to look at it she requested, "Play me your favorite song."

Edward groaned. He didn't even know where to begin with that one. "Just hit play."

She rolled her eyes at him and turned on the music, cocking her head to the side thoughtfully as the opening notes began playing. "I like this."

"Then I guess we can still be friends."

"Oh, thank God." Bella sighed in a completely over the top fashion. She looked out the window again, and a few moments later commented, "Your mom seems really nice."

"You've met her before, you know," Edward pointed out.

"I know, but that was always because I was hanging around Emmett. I guess I figured she was nice to me by association."

"She's probably down there plotting ways to keep you here forever." Edward laughed.

"I don't think it'd take much," Bella answered, the hint of a smile on her face for a moment before she shook her head side to side and glanced out the window.

"What's your mom like?" He'd found himself curious about Bella's mother recently. Emmett had only met her a few times, before Bella was old enough to travel by herself, and didn't seem to have much of an opinion. The only things Edward knew about Reneé were her name and that, judging from a couple of pictures, Bella looked just like her.

"She's alright. She's kind of more like an aunt or an older sister most of the time… she's not very maternal. That sounds really bad." Bella cringed and looked a bit embarrassed. "I mean, she took care of me, and always made sure I was happy and had whatever I needed, but that mother-daughter relationship thing, we don't really have that."

"What about your dad? He's always seemed more the parental type. Is that why you moved here?" It was actually quite the understatement. Edward knew Charlie took to being a parent like a fish to water, and he'd always treated Edward and Jasper the same as he did Emmett.

"Not exactly. My mom and I had moved to Phoenix the year before and I didn't really like the school. I never got to know Emmett all that well, and I was starting to realize that I could say the same thing for Charlie. She got remarried, and I thought it was a good time."

"Do you miss her?"

"Every day," Bella answered, "but it was the right thing to do. I'm really glad I took the chance to know Charlie better when I had it."

"Why do you always call your dad 'Charlie'?" Edward asked. It was yet another something he'd been wondering about for a while.

"I never really thought about it." Bella wrinkled her nose as she thought, and after a moment continued, "Emmett always did. I guess it just… stuck."

"You looked up to him," Edward theorized, but Bella shook her head in denial.

"Not at first. I didn't really know Emmett all that well until I moved here. We talked, and we hung out when I came to visit, but that was pretty much it. I guess I just didn't want him to feel like he was on the outside. I didn't want to call Charlie 'dad' when Emmett had just lost his."

"Weren't you like, seven?" Edward had always assumed the contents of little girls' thoughts to revolve around pigtails and cooties, not whether or not their abruptly adopted brother felt comfortable during the few weeks out of the year they spent under the same roof.

"Six," Bella corrected. "So?"

It was another observation to mark down with all the other things he'd learned about her over the course of the night. It could have been the sudden and extreme realization that he hadn't ever really known Bella in any substantial way, or maybe it was just that the light streaming through his bedroom window cast shades of red through her hair that were nearly hypnotizing, but in that moment Edward thought that she just might have been the most amazing girl he would ever encounter, no matter how long and hard he looked.

"What about your dad?" Bella asked.

He should have known it would come up, and now he was the one left struggling with how to phrase his answer so he wouldn't sound like a complete ass. "He's… he's not really around, you know?"

"He works a lot, huh?"

"Yeah. To tell the truth your dad was always more of a father to me than mine."

Bella smiled, and nodded her head. "Charlie's awesome like that; he likes to take in strays. Do you resent him for not always being there? Your dad?"

"No. He always made sure to be around for the important stuff. We still had the family dinners a couple times a week. He came to all my school stuff, and we had our time together even if it wasn't very often."

Bella smiled in understanding and sat down next to him, nodding her head in time with the music as she dropped her bag on the floor with an audible thud.

"What in the hell do you have in there?" Edward asked, gaping at the black canvas that didn't seem nearly large enough to make that kind of a noise unless it was filled with bricks.

"Just stuff. You can look if you want."

Edward may have been curious enough to take her up on the offer, but there was a small nagging in the back of his head that didn't feel right about it. He wanted to know everything about her, but it was one thing to pour over books and CDs, another to go rifling through her purse. He didn't want to learn about Bella like that. He shook his head, and she smiled at him, like she'd been hoping he'd respond that way.

The next song that came up on the shuffle sparked a debate of cover songs versus the originals, and it was right at the moment Bella leaned his head against his shoulder and laughed at his insistence that there were some songs that should just never be redone, no matter what, that he realized he kind of liked having her in his bedroom.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Chapter 5 on Thursday, 12/15**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Beta'd by the lovely sweeneyanne, and preread by the amazetasticness of aerobee82 & AlexisDanaan.**

**Do not own the Twilight.**

* * *

><p><strong><span>June 12, 2011<span>**

It wasn't that Edward had been afraid to talk to his father about the opportunity he'd offered. It was just that Edward had realized he wasn't sure exactly what Carlisle expected from him, and that made him worry. Carlisle had been proud when Edward was accepted to Harvard, and he had seemed pleased when Edward had told him that he planned to study medicine, but looking back, Edward couldn't be positive his interpretation was correct.

He remembered Frank Whitlock's insistent tone every time he informed Jasper that he _would_ be attending his alma mater, and he _would_ be studying law—and Carlisle had never done anything that could be considered even mildly comparable. Edward had gone to Harvard of his own volition, and it may have been because that's where Carlisle went, but he had never been pressured into it.

It was hard to know how to open the conversation when he didn't even know if Carlisle was likely to be disappointed in him. Should he treat it like business, or more familiar; he could be blunt, or try to lead Carlisle to the conclusion through some other discussion. There were thousands of variations to consider, and Edward used the guise of pondering just how to handle the situation best to delay the inevitable. Part of him hoped that while going over all these different choices he would come to the conclusion that, obviously, he wanted to be a doctor, and he must have been crazy to ever doubt that.

He should have known he wouldn't be so lucky. In the end Edward decided that being straight-forward was probably the best solution.

It had taken two weeks before Edward had managed to find an opportunity to talk to his father while he had the proper resolve, and he didn't realize that he was driving toward the Swan's house after leaving Carlisle's office until he was halfway there. He wanted someone to share his relief with. He also hadn't seen Bella nearly enough lately.

Carlisle was far more understanding than Edward had thought he'd be. Honestly, he hadn't expected arguments and attempts to persuade him into taking the opportunity laid out before him—but he also hadn't expected Carlisle to nod thoughtfully and tell him that the offer was standing. The whole thing was done in fifteen minutes. He was left with an unsettled feeling of being set free and left stranded all at once, and he wondered if that was how Bella had felt that day she'd dropped her classes, hopped in her truck, and left Florida for good.

True to their agreement Bella had stopped being so evasive, but things were still delicate between them. They never discussed the message she'd sent him that night after he'd gotten home from the football field, and that weight was almost tangible. Bella was right. The only reason any of this felt off was because he'd assumed it would, and it didn't. It felt easy.

Edward wanted to explore the possibility of a relationship with Bella. He'd long ago resolved to be that bad guy who slept with his friend's sister, but again, he couldn't find anything in him that regretted it. The only thing he wished was different was the circumstances. He wished she'd figure out what it was she wanted so he could adapt. He just wanted some sort of stability instead of this constant push and pull of what was allowed and what wasn't; what they could talk about and what wasn't open for discussion.

He wanted to ask her why she left in the morning instead of letting him take her to breakfast.

He wanted to know if he was allowed to kiss her like he wanted to.

He wanted to know why the fuck Jasper had suddenly decided that his arm should be slung over her shoulders everywhere they went, and what the hell were they playing at with that one anyway? Alice was going to throw an even bigger shit fit than she had the last time. Either that or Edward was going to wind up punching Jasper in the face, and he didn't want to have to explain something like that.

Edward couldn't figure out how in the hell he managed to get himself into this mess. He couldn't really even figure out when it had all started tangling together to weave into what it had somehow become.

Bella practically flew out the front door the moment he pulled into the driveway, and when she caught sight of his car parked behind hers she scowled and made a bee-line for the passenger side door. He barely had time to unlock it before she tugged on the handle.

"If you want to talk about something, then you're going to have to drive me to work. I'm already late."

Edward nodded, and shifted to reverse once Bella was buckled in. It wasn't the first time she'd made this particular demand, and it wouldn't be the last. He never worried about it too much; Bella's overly cautious driving coupled with the beast of a truck that died if it was pushed past fifty miles an hour meant that in reality, he had plenty of time to get her wherever she needed to go.

"You got the dinner-shift, huh?" Edward asked as he shifted back into drive and started heading toward the main road.

"Yeah. Seems like they give me more and more of them because I'm the only one who doesn't bitch about it."

"This is just you grabbing onto the opportunity to make me keep you company all night, isn't it?"

"I'll buy you dinner?" Bella replied, sounding embarrassed for being called out on her incredibly transparent attempt at manipulating him.

"You mean you'll call out for take-out, and make me go pick it up?"

Bella shrugged, completely unabashed. He didn't even mind, not really. He just wanted to tease her a bit. Evenings spent at the police station had become somewhat common over the course of last summer, and it was something he was happy to have back. He glanced over at her bag in her lap, and wondered how many books she'd brought along with her. His guess was at least two.

Edward dropped Bella off at the front door of the police station. He barely beat the rush at the local diner to pick up dinner for them, and before he knew it he was pulling into one of the parking spots around the side of the building and taking a deep breath to get himself in line. It was anything unusual for him to hang out with Bella while she was working—one of the perks of her father being in charge at the station—but every interaction with Bella had to be handled with a sort of caution now. He didn't want to give too much away and scare her off, but he also wanted to probe just enough to figure out where she stood.

The reality was just as difficult and complicated as it sounded in his head.

Thankfully, Bella seemed to be on the same page as him, and while that same tension that had littered their time together ever since the beginning of the summer was present, there was more ease to the atmosphere as well. When he packed up the styrofoam containers and went to throw them away she looked at him curiously for a moment before coming to some unknown decision.

"You could stay," Bella offered. "You should stay."

"Alright," Edward agreed, taking care to not let it show how happy the invitation made him.

Bella rummaged through her backpack once he reclaimed his seat, and extracted a book from the worn canvas to toss in his direction. He had to bend to right at a nearly painful angle to both catch the book and avoid falling out of his chair. "I've read this before. Not recently though."

"I assumed," Bella conceded, turning her attention back to the scanner. "It's yours."

"It is?" Edward asked, wrinkling his nose as flipped through the pages and tried to remember lending it to her. "When did you borrow it?"

"March."

He raised his head and arched an eyebrow across the room at her. "You've been stealing my books?"

"_Borrowing,_" Bella stressed. She looked embarrassed.

Edward arched an eyebrow at her and let her stew for a moment before asking, "What exactly where you doing in my bedroom?"

She didn't answer, and Edward examined the book Bella had returned to him. It was one of his favorites, but he wasn't sure if he'd ever told her that.

"Did you like it?"

"Very much."

A tense silence swept through the room. Bella turned her attention back to her work, and Edward aimlessly flipped through pages he'd read before as he tried to think of something else to say. He didn't understand how she could make him feel so nervous without even trying. It was like as soon as he got within a certain radius of her he became this bumbling fourteen year old boy who'd never even spoken to a girl before.

"I missed you," Bella said quietly. It took Edward a few seconds to figure out what she was talking about. "I just— I wanted to be in your space, even if it was just to borrow a book."

"Okay." Edward shrugged, and tried not to let on how much he liked hearing her say that. "You know, you could come over now that I'm actually home. Mom's getting twitchy, says she's gonna come kidnap you."

"Oh, I've missed cooking with your mom," Bella said with a fond little smile on her face.

"There's a very simple solution, you know—" He was pushing again, but only a little. It was something Edward couldn't really help; with everything else about his life so up in the air, it felt good to have something to strive toward.

"It's not like you've been stopping by, either," Bella pointed out.

"I'm worried that your father is going to shoot me."

Bella scoffed and shook her head. "Charlie likes you."

"But I doubt he'd like knowing what I think about his daughter," Edward countered, glancing around to ensure there were no eavesdroppers who might report back to Charlie.

"What, do you think he'd rather see me with Jasper the Wannabe-Felon?" Bella laughed and shook her head. Her dismissal made him feel more secure in the position he'd decided to play in this little game between them—but he still had questions, and now was as good a time as any to ask them.

"I don't know it seems like something is going on there. I just can't figure out what." He wasn't sure if it was a question he wanted to know the answer to, but he did know that this hurdle was one that needed to be cleared, one way or the other.

"It really bothers you, doesn't it?" she asked as she leaned forward and turned her head in an attempt to get a better view of his face. "Why?"

"I guess I'm just curious. Jasper's not really a talkative guy, and that's fine. It's not like I want to sit around gushing about our feelings or some lame shit—but he won't say a word about you, and it makes me wonder what he's hiding."

"Did you ever stop to think that maybe he just doesn't think it's anybody else's business?"

"No. This is _Jasper_ we're talking about."

"It's most definitely not like that. He's just a little protective of me. Does it really bother you?" she wondered again, and after a moment Edward nodded. It did, no matter how hard he tried to prevent it.

"I don't know what you want me to tell you," Bella admitted. "After everything that happened this winter, he was… he was there for me. He sat and listened to me talk for hours about why I left school and how I wasn't sure what in the hell I was doing with my life. He's my best friend, but that's all that's ever going to be there."

"Does he know that?" Edward muttered. This really wasn't the time for his jealousy, but now that they'd started talking he was having a hard time keeping it under wraps.

"Yes."

"What about Alice? Does she know any of this?"

Bella made a little noise of disgust and shook her head twice. "That girl believes what she wants to."

Edward was sure that if he tried hard enough, he could come up with enough questions to take them far into the next day—but Bella was done with this topic, and her apprehension was enough that he didn't even mind letting the topic fade into a comfortable silence.

The evening passed, and the further the sun sunk into the horizon the slower the station got, and once it had been twenty minutes since Bella had needed to actually do any work she pulled her bag into her lap and started piling various items from inside on top of the desk.

"I can't believe you still have that thing," Edward said, nodding toward her camera. It was so old the finish was chipping, and he could tell that she'd had to replace the strap recently. "Where do you even get film for it?"

"Online," Bella answered, "and I like my camera, thank you very much. It appeals to my impatient side."

"You could just get a digital camera."

"Those are too—"Bella bit her lip as she tried to come up with an appropriate word. She located a deck of cards from in one of the pockets of her bag, nodded, and looked up at him. "Sterile. They're too sterile. This is real. Its actual film and moving parts and a picture that I can touch."

This was more like typical nights spent at the police station.

Bella could still kick his ass at poker, but she'd taught him enough to be able to hold his own. Eventually she'd confessed that she just wanted to make sure he was better than Jasper, though his increased aptitude hadn't stopped Jasper from suggesting strip-poker every chance he got. Edward didn't care if he was better at cards than the rest of Forks combined, there was absolutely no way he would ever let Jasper set house rules again.

They passed the time with the shuffling of cards and crackle of the scanner echoing through the building. The nice thing about Bella was that she didn't feel the need to fill every moment with conversation. She was able to just be, and Edward liked that—to be with her.

Officers came and went without as much as a second look in their direction. It was a quiet night, but then again, the only one who ever made any noise around town was Jasper. Even he didn't usually cause enough trouble for a call to come into the station though, at least, not for a couple of years. Bella took a sip from her fourth coffee of the night—Edward didn't understand how she could stand to drink the stuff—and sighed, glancing behind her at the clock.

"You only have a couple of hours left," Edward observed.

"It's strange," Bella said. The corner of her lip quirked up and her eyes narrowed by some infinitesimal amount that he was sure no one but him would ever have noticed. "It feels like days away, but it's like I've only been here for ten minutes. Time… I love the inconsistency of it."

"What the hell kind of classes were you taking down in Florida? Did you flirt with majoring in philosophy?"

Bella threw back her head and laughed, startling the deputy sitting at his desk across the room. "I may have."

"You never did tell me what you're going to do now. Are you going back?"

"No. I don't think so. Not there, anyway."

"Colorado?" Edward asked, remembering a conversation had a thousand miles away and too many months before.

Bella wrinkled her nose in distaste. "Definitely not Colorado."

"You could come to Massachusetts," he suggested. He could have predicted the exact way her head tilted and shook twice in response. It bothered him less than he would have thought, but that was the advantage to all the effort he'd put in to learn her tells.

#

"Why were you coming over earlier?" Bella asked, kicking her legs from the porch swing.

"I talked to my father. I can't believe I forgot to tell you." Edward stood across from her, leaning against the railing of the Swan's front porch. He wasn't quite ready to call it a night, though that time was coming soon.

Bella grinned up at him, and that was all the reaction he got out of her. She just got it. This was why he preferred her company.

"You wanna go get what could be a very late dinner or a very early breakfast?" Edward asked even though he knew she wouldn't say yes. Bella never let him buy her breakfast. Not when they were just friends staying out all night, and not when she spent the night in his bed. It was oddly comforting that at least one thing between them had always remained static.

"I think I should probably get inside."

"Alright." Edward nodded, and after a flash of indecision he stepped forward and hugged her. "I'll see you around."

Bella's arms came up around him just long enough to give him a squeeze, and then she stepped back and reached out for the doorknob. She looked a bit out of sorts, but she smiled when she said, "Goodnight, Edward."

The sight of her biting her lip stayed wedged in the front of his mind the entire drive home.

The first step into the house always creaked. When he was younger Edward made sure to step around that spot on the floor, but he hadn't had to come in so quietly in long enough that he forgot.

"Well, well, what do we have here?" a voice echoed to the right. Edward was so wound up over the stupid creaking floorboard that he actually startled.

"That was completely unnecessary," he hissed. A light clicked on in the living room to reveal his mother curled up in one of the loungers with a blanket and a book.

"You do realize that you're an adult now," Esme chided with an amused glint in her eyes. "There's no reason to sneak in and out of the house."

It felt like a trap, but Edward was too tired to find a way to sidestep it. Instead he answered, "Old habits. Did you wait up all night?"

The thought made him feel guilty. He should have called.

"Yes. It's my God-given right as a parent to make my child feel bad for making me sleep in the armchair just to scare him when he finally comes home." Esme chuckled.

"Sorry."

"It's alright. You know I don't sleep well when your dad isn't home anyway. So, who is she?" Esme asked. She stood and stretched her arms over her head before rolling her shoulders back.

"Who is… who?"

"The girl." Esme laughed. "Oh, how I miss seeing that look on your face."

"What look?"

Esme took a few steps toward him and reached out a hand to touch Edward's eyebrow. "There's this way your forehead crinkles, right here. Dead giveaway. It means you're hiding something. It probably makes me a bad mom that I wish I got to see it more often, huh?"

"There is no girl," Edward insisted. He swatted Esme's hand from his face and turned to make his way to his bedroom.

"Whatever you say, darling! Tell Bella to stop being such a stranger."

It took everything he had in him to keep walking to his bedroom and pretend like his mother hadn't just hit the nail square on the head, with a sledgehammer.

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><p><strong>AN: Teasers are now going out with the Fictionator's weekly posts, as well as on my blog when I have time. Next chapter will post next Thursday.**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Beta'd by sweeneyanne (who is awesome), and pre-read by aerobee82 (who is awesome) and AlexisDanaan (who is awesome).**

**Love to everyone who reads, reviews, faves, etc. Have a wonderful holiday, everyone! :-)**

**Don't own Twilight.**

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><p><strong><span>July 14, 2010<span>**

The best part of Jasper having a girlfriend was that he seemed to calm down, if only a little. Or, at least, that was Edward's official opinion. The truth was that Bella was right—Alice wasn't an easy person to get along with, though she didn't have nearly as much animosity toward him as she did Bella. Jasper's relationship with Alice shook through the mismatched group and left a wide fracture in its path that only Jasper himself managed to stay oblivious to, and that, as horrible as it sounded, was Edward's favorite part of Jasper's new relationship status.

The truth was that he was irrationally happy that Jasper had found his way in with Alice, because that meant Bella had more time to spend with him. He was such a bad friend.

Edward couldn't put his finger on why, but he was intrigued by Bella's struggle to keep herself impartial while rapidly trying to come to terms with her perceived second-place status in Jasper's life. She was so determined to be the bigger person, to not let Alice get to her, and Edward admired her for it. No matter how many dirty looks she got she just kept marching on. Bella encouraged Jasper's relationship despite the glaringly obvious fact it was nearly impossible for her and Alice to get along, and all the while she never let herself give away that part of her Edward knew was scared of losing her friend.

Edward didn't think it was going to last. In the end Jasper wasn't the kind of guy who gave up his friends for pussy—Jasper's words, not his—and once the whirlwind of the whole thing wore off, Jasper would do what he had to in order to make up for his absence now. He wasn't sure if Bella believed him, but he also thought that her reluctance had little to do with Jasper himself.

The one point he had managed to convince her on was that when Emmett finished up his summer term and came home, Jasper was sure to make time to hang out with them. Edward had nearly groaned at the thought. Jasper and Emmett were each handfuls on their own, and he was quickly learning that Bella fit right in with them; all three of them within in the city limits was sure to get at least one of them stuck in the eight by ten holding cell at the Forks Police Station to think about what they'd done. His money was on Jasper. It always wound up being Jasper.

A new pattern had come into being over the course of his two months back in Forks. Instead of running around town trying to keep Jasper and Emmett from acting like jackasses he found himself in a more comfortable lull. Since befriending Bella, Jasper had toned down the recklessness; since Alice he'd become nearly docile. Edward wondered if it was just that Jasper was happier now than he had been when his father was alive, or if it had something to do with his expanded social circle.

When she wasn't running around town with Jasper, Bella was, more often than not, at Edward's house. It was something that had started gradually, with her first visit, and proceeded to snowball until it had somehow morphed into days spent lounging with a book in his bedroom, or afternoons in the kitchen with Esme. If she had been anyone else he might have found himself jealous of how much time his mother spent with her, but in reality he liked that they got along so well. According to Bella she never got to do those sorts of things with her own mother, and he knew Esme relished the chance to spend time with a young woman when she was generally surrounded on all sides by men.

He'd gotten to know Bella well over the past month, and the simple truth was that he liked her, a lot—but he absolutely refused to analyze in which way that affection was skewed.

"Oh my God, you drive like a blind ninety-two year old," Jasper complained from the passenger seat.

"I drive like a sane person."

"You drive like a loser."

Edward allowed the car to slow by a couple of miles an hour. Jasper slumped further into his seat and sulked.

Edward had known they were going to beat Bella to her house, but he hadn't thought of who would be there to greet them. Charlie Swan was one of those men who were imposing through his presence. He had a firmness to his look that commanded respect, and as soon as Edward pulled up alongside the curb in front of the Swan house he realized that this would be the first time he had to look Charlie in the eye since he'd started thinking of Bella in ways that were a little too familiar.

Logically he had no need to worry. Edward had always gotten along with Chief Swan. When Emmett had lost his parents and the Chief took him in as his own son he'd cut back his hours at the station drastically, and it had fallen to him and Esme to negotiate rides back and forth between their houses and Jasper's, to school, and to little league games. Back then Edward's dad had still worked at the hospital, and put in even more hours than he did now. Somewhere between childhood and graduating high-school Edward had a period of time where he felt angry and resentful that his own father couldn't be bothered to make time for his son, and had spent many hours at the Swan house as a result. Charlie was the man who taught him many of his life's greatest lessons. He taught him how to shoot, how to throw a punch, and what exactly it meant to be a good guy.

Edward may have learned a lot about love from his parents, but he learned what it meant to be a man from Charlie.

Yet, walking up the driveway felt uncomfortable. He followed Jasper through the front door and came face to face with the man who had shared his morals and conceptions of justice with him as a child and as a teenager, and a little part of him wanted to blurt out that Bella was lovely, really, and insist that he'd never had a dishonorable bone in his body. It was a complete overreaction. No matter how many times Edward tried to tell himself he had no reason to feel guilty, his palms still sweat.

Standing in the Swan's kitchen had never felt so uncomfortable. It was as if with one glance at him Charlie knew exactly what had been running through Edward's head the past three weeks. It was crazy, it was irrational, but Edward was positive that Charlie knew exactly what sort of thoughts he'd been having about his daughter. Charlie's gaze felt more suspicious by the second.

"Come on, Edward," Jasper said cheerfully. "Bella stole my Stones t-shirt like, months ago, and I'm gonna get it back."

He considered poking through Bella's room while Jasper lounged in the rocking chair as payback—she was the one who started snooping first—but Jasper wouldn't let him any further than the bookcase. It was incredibly difficult to reconcile Jasper's split loyalties when less than a year ago he would been cheering him on and rummaging through Bella's underwear drawer. It was a change in him that was exclusive to Bella; she was the only one he graced with extra consideration, including Edward himself. Edward thought it was bizarre. He also reluctantly admitted to himself that it seemed Bella's influence had been good for Jasper in some way, even if he didn't understand it.

Bella's room was about what he expected, with some noticeable variations. He would have put good money on her having an overflowing bookcase, and he'd figured her music would be somewhere out in the open, because she'd been so confused when his wasn't. He had not expected nearly an entire wall of her room to be taken up by a cork-board overflowing with the amount of polaroid photos tacked to it. She had pictures of everything and everyone on there.

"Now that you're home we're going to have to figure out a way to get that damn camera away from her," Jasper commented.

Edward didn't reply—he just smiled at the wall of photos one more time before moving to the bookshelf. He'd find an excuse to look at them later.

The sound of the front door slamming echoed through the open doorway of Bella's room, and Edward shoved the four CDs he'd been looking at back on the shelf.

"Dude, relax. She's not going to kick your ass for looking at her music." Jasper paused for a moment before adding, "Actually, she'd probably want to debate the contrasts and similarities in your taste and hers for the next six hours, so maybe it's best if she doesn't know. I already suffered through that ride once."

"She's got good taste," Edward said as he resumed shuffling through Bella's shelves. He'd almost been hoping to find that what they had in common was limited to what they had already discussed and debated; instead he had to admit that their taste was more complimentary than he'd thought, from books and music to the few movies she had leaning against the left side of her bookcase on the top shelf.

"You know that I'm on to you, right?" Jasper asked.

"I have no idea what you're talking about." He really hoped that Jasper wasn't referring to what he thought he was. Namely the increasingly large amount of space Bella took up in his head.

"That's cool. If you want to play it like that, then fine. Just know that I see what's going on."

Edward needed to change the subject.

"What's up with you and Alice?" It looked like it was getting to be serious, or at least something more than casual.

"She's alright," Jasper answered easily. "She's fun."

"I can't believe you invited her tonight." It was mind-boggling on so many levels.

Jasper watched Edward for a moment before replying, "I was hoping I could get her and Bella in the same room long enough for them to realize they don't hate each other."

After the confession, Jasper schooled his expression into neutrality with a practiced ease that Edward didn't know if he should be concerned for or jealous of. It was just as well, he had no idea how to respond. He hadn't considered the possibility that Jasper actually _liked_ Alice, and he felt bad for under-estimating his friend by such a wide margin.

"_What?"_ Bella's voice shot up the stairs and into her room, and for the second time Edward shoved the items he'd been examining back on the shelf he'd found them. He hoped they were in the right order. He turned just in time to see Bella come charging into the room and level Jasper with a suspicious glare. "What did you do? Just tell me now."

Jasper shook his head mockingly. "Why in the world would I tell you?"

"I swear, if you switched all my CD cases again, I'll kick your ass so hard—"

"I'd put your mind at ease by telling you nobody went anywhere near your music, but, well…" Jasper interrupted Bella's tirade with an accusatory glance in Edward's direction. Edward thought ass-kicking was a terrific idea.

Bella looked at him oddly for a moment before snapping out of whatever had her so wound up. Under normal circumstances he would have been worried she was angry with him, but Bella regarded him with more of a passing curiosity than ire. When she spoke again she seemed calmer, but still frazzled. "Ok. Well, can we please cease the impromptu tour of my bedroom? I swear I cannot believe Charlie let you up here again."

"The Chief knows you had that last one coming." Jasper laughed and ducked when Bella grabbed the hairbrush off the top of her dresser and threw it, even though there was no chance of it actually hitting him. Bella had the worst aim.

"_Out!"_

Edward had absolutely no idea what in the hell was going on, though it was quite funny. It didn't seem like a good time to ask, either, so he followed Jasper out of the room and kept the dozen questions on the tip of his tongue silent. He didn't realize until he was back in the kitchen that Jasper hadn't even looked for his t-shirt.

"Very funny, Old Man." Bella scowled at Charlie, who looked entirely too amused by his daughter's irritation.

"It's not my fault you befriended the town hooligan," Charlie replied calmly.

"Hooligan," Jasper mused. "I like that one."

Edward leaned against the counter and observed as the conversation flowed through the kitchen in waves of sarcasm laced with affection and familiarity. It was sort of fascinating; Jasper had always been a bit of a rebel, and certainly had kept Charlie on his toes throughout their teenage years, but there was a definite cooling to his attitude now. It took Edward a few minutes to recognize it as respect. Perhaps it wasn't Bella or Alice who were responsible for Jasper's improved behavior, or at least not just them.

Jasper had, for the most part, kept his nose clean since last September. The deal seemed to be that as long as the parties were small, contained, and controlled, then Charlie would grudgingly write them off as harmless teenage fun. He probably relied a bit on Bella to keep it from getting out of hand as well.

The three of them quibbled over everything from Jasper's car to dinner comprising entirely of pizza—a point which Bella apparently found atrocious—right up until the moment the doorbell rang and Bella stiffened in anticipation of what was sure to be a less than fun evening for her. Edward thought it was admirable that she was trying so hard. She not only had agreed to an evening with a girl who didn't like her, but also allowed the interaction to take place in her home.

Edward had no idea how in the hell Jasper had talked Alice into coming to Bella's house. Even more confusing was Angela's arrival a few minutes later, though at least she was someone he was happy to see. If it had just been the four of them his brain probably would have tried to twist the situation into some sort of bizarre double-date chaperoned by Chief Swan—with Angela there it was much easier to see it as an evening spent with friends.

Either that or the entire thing would implode into some sort of disaster within the hour. He felt an inescapable need to remove himself from the situation, if only by a few yards and when Angela migrated toward the living room Edward pulled himself away from the counter and followed.

He'd never paid much attention to the line of pictures atop the mantle, but he felt drawn to them this time. There was a steady progression of Bella and Emmett's lives caught on film. There were even a few photos of Emmett that included him and Jasper, and on the far right one of Jasper and Bella amidst a sea of wrapping paper—he could only assume it had been Christmas. The picture felt unsettling in some way, though he wasn't sure why.

"Why in the world would anyone give Bella a baseball bat?" Angela asked, gesturing at one of the photos closer to the left while trying, and failing, to contain her chuckles. Bella must have been around six or seven when the picture was taken—she stood grinning next to a wary looking Emmett decked out in his little league uniform with his bat propped up against her shoulder.

"They must have had a death wish."

"It's cute though."

Edward nodded. It was one of his favorites out of the bunch. He barely remembered Bella from when they were kids—she'd only been around for a few weeks each year—but he felt like he could almost recall this picture being taken. He wondered if he'd been there, just slightly off to the side and out of the frame. It was a staggering reminder of why he'd been so surprised to realize that Bella was actually a girl that he had interest in. She was Emmett's sister, the evidence was right there on the mantle. He wasn't supposed to see her that way.

It was becoming increasingly difficult to keep that in mind.

The gathering in the kitchen slowly trickled out into the living room. Pizza boxes were scattered over the coffee table and seats were claimed. He wound up sitting next to Angela on the floor, Bella on the couch behind him—he wasn't going to complain about it. Once the opening credits started to roll across the television screen Edward snuck a glance behind him at Bella. She looked far less annoyed than he'd thought she would be.

"It was Jasper's turn to pick the movie," Bella shrugged.

Before he could even think about what he was saying Edward asked, "When is it my turn?"

Charlie gave him another of those looks that made him feel entirely too uncomfortable in his own skin. Edward snapped his attention back to the movie—he already had no idea what was going on. He probably could have figured it out quickly, Jasper had selected an older Kung-Fu film, and really, it couldn't have been all that complex, but Bella kept fidgeting behind him. She would shift and tap her fingers on her thighs and move her legs again; it was incredibly distracting.

Eventually Bella started playing with the strands of his hair, tugging on little sections seemingly at random. Finally he turned and asked, "What are you doing?"

"Nothing. Watch the movie." She pulled on another piece of his hair and fiddled with the strands. He had no idea what she was doing; whatever it was felt kind of good.

A few minutes later Jasper made a transparent attempt to cover a laugh with a cough. Edward couldn't figure out what in the hell was so funny. Picking up the plot was a lost cause, and Edward spent his time watching without really understanding, and contemplating the oddities of the group converged in the Swan's living room.

Alice had been surprisingly calm; Angela surprisingly silent. Edward wondered if that had anything to do with the hints of flirtation he'd picked up on between her and Jasper during the poker game at the beginning of the summer, but that didn't make much sense. Jasper flirted with nearly every woman he encountered, and Angela was savvy enough to not only know that, but also know that it meant very little.

Bella had spent the entire evening stiff and cautious. Jasper and Charlie both appeared to be purposefully distancing themselves as much as possible from whatever it was they thought was happening with the girls. Edward supposed he probably fell into that category, too—he was putting a significant effort into pretending that everything was just fine, and not awkward as all hell.

Edward let out a breath when the movie finally ended, and he thought that he'd probably made his relief that the evening was soon to be over a little too obvious when Jasper and Charlie shared a chuckle.

"Well, it's been fun," Jasper said as he stood and stretched. "But I think my ride is ready to call it a night."

Alice muttered, "Thanks for having me." It might have been the most she'd spoken all night—it was, at the least, the most she'd said within earshot of Edward.

"Drive safe, kids," Charlie said instead of goodbye.

Bella relaxed the moment the front door closed behind Alice. She tugged at his hair one last time before nudging him with her leg to get up.

Charlie glanced over at Edward and chuckled. "Word to the wise, son. Don't let Bella play with your hair. She gave poor Emmett a complex by the time he was thirteen."

It took Edward a few moments to sort out what Charlie had said, and he ran his fingers through his hair to find countless small pieces twisted together into what he assumed were braids. The glare he aimed at Bella wasn't sincere, but he still had to ask, "What the hell?"

Bella cringed a bit when Edward stood up, and as he walked down the hall he heard her call out, "Oh, it's not like it won't come out!"

Angela called out a moment later, "I think it looks good on you!"

He saw the flash in the mirror before he even had a chance to register the sight of the camera.

"You've got to be kidding me." There wasn't much he could do besides laugh. It was all just so absurd.

"Don't worry, I won't show anyone." Bella chuckled, watching him in the mirror. "Here, I'll help you."

"It's only fair. How the hell did you do this?" The braids were so tiny he could barely pull them apart.

"Sorry. I don't like to just sit. I always feel too antsy." Bella pushed his hands out of the way and reached up to start undoing all the little twists. "You're too tall."

"Why does this not surprise me," Edward muttered.

"Oh, hush. You know you can't resist my quirky charms," Bella argued before tugging on the back of his shirt collar. "You are going to have to sit or lean your head back or… something."

Edward absolutely was not going to tell her that she was right. He just leaned his head back and hoped she could get them all out before he got a crick in his neck. He told himself that it was not endearing and sweet of her to undo the mess she'd made of his hair as a result of her nervous fidgeting, which, for the record, was also neither cute nor adorable.

Edward had always thought he was better at controlling himself than this.

"And done," Bella whispered, smoothing the lock of hair she'd been untangling back into place. He saw Bella smile in the reflection of the mirror before she picked up her camera with the still developing photograph sticking out of it. "You can hold on to it, if you want."

He almost took her up on the offer—Jasper would tease him mercilessly if there was evidence floating around, but then he remembered the wall of polaroids in her bedroom. There was no reason for it, he just wanted to be a part of the expansive collage that illustrated the way she saw the world through a camera lens. "It's okay."

The corner of Bella lip curled up a little further in response, and Edward thought that maybe what he liked best about her was that she made him feel like he had all the right answers.

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><p><strong>AN: See you in 2012 for chapter 7!**


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: Beta'd by the lovely SweeneyAnne. Pre-read by aerobee82 & AlexisDanaan. They make the words all pretty.**

**Don't own Twilight.**

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><p><strong><span>June 20, 2011<span>**

Waves of soft brown hair fell over his pillowcase and warm, heavy breath shuddered against his neck. Lips rubbed over skin. Sweat gathered between his shoulder-blades. An oh, so very pleasant ache coiled in his abdomen, and it felt like if she would just push a little harder he could be flying. The room felt plush as it contracted around the tangle of limbs and dancing fingers scraping their nails up his back.

There was a giggle.

Fingers laced through his and gripped tight. His entire body felt hot. His heart pounded against his ribs and the coil wound tighter and tighter—he couldn't wait for the pressure to cede so the tension could snap. Something amazing was going to happen. Any minute now…

He heard his name, garbled, as if he were under water.

Lips pressed against his, comforting in the way that they were familiar and unassuming, the way they knew him inside and out and yet still wanted to learn more. Questions danced in the air buzzing over his skin, and when fingers pulled at the hair at his nape they all went spiralling away. All he could hear was the sound of his breath moving in and out of his lungs.

She sighed, the rise and fall of her chest echoed in his own.

Every muscle in his body felt tense, like they had all flexed and pulled at the same moment and it was all he could do to keep from collapsing. Her legs squeezed his. Her heel dragged a path down the back of his calf before settling.

His heart pounded away to the rhythm of _soon, soon, soon_, even as something in the air shifted and began to pull away.

The background noise grew little by little, the warmth and safety of the thick atmosphere that surrounded him started to dissipate. His eyelids glowed with a bright light just beyond them, and he turned his head, wanting the dark and soft comfort of the dream. His name was called out once more, and he couldn't help but blink. The mirage faded.

There was— There was a girl perched on the edge of his bed watching him.

"What were you dreaming about?" Bella asked, waggling her eyebrows in that ridiculous way that Jasper always did.

Edward hadn't known there were so many variations of tired, or that it was possible for them all to gang up on him at once and force words out of his mouth. "You."

"Oh." He thought she must have suspected as much, but she certainly didn't think he was going to be so straight-forward about it.

"What time is it?" Edward rubbed his eyes and when he opened them again his vision was much clearer—too clear. He wanted the blurriness of his dream.

"Almost nine." Bella eyed him warily.

Edward sat in one swift motion—he had no idea he was capable of such quick action so soon after waking—grabbed Bella's arm and tugged her back down with him. Her fall was awkward, and she landed half on her back, half on her side with a loud exhale. She glared at him, but he couldn't bring himself to regret being so bold. "What was that for?"

"Shh… Go to sleep." Edward whispered into her hair as he drew her close after giving her a moment to straighten herself out so that she had her forehead tucked under his chin. At some point over the course of the past year Edward had learned that Esme wasn't the only one who was a hugger. It must be genetic.

"I've got things to do," Bella said. Her body relaxed by a fraction, and after a brief pause she wriggled closer. "I was only coming over to find out what kind of cake you wanted."

"Don't care," Edward mumbled. "You pick."

"I can't stay."

He was halfway back to sleep when he muttered, "You never do."

Bella stilled her struggle and pressed her face to his chest. Even in sleep he could feel her breath on him.

It felt like days later when he was awoken by fingers tapping his cheek in a light and mismatched rhythm. He tried to swat them away, but the hand caught his, and he heard Bella whisper, "You have to get up now."

"No." Edward groaned and pulled his hand away from hers to cover his eyes. "What time is it now?"

"Ten."

"Slightly better." Not by much, though. He would have slept until noon if he'd had any say in it, which he clearly did not.

"You can't spend all day in bed," Bella said firmly, but there was an undertone of something else. Edward probably could have figured out what it was if he were more awake.

"You're still here." That hadn't actually ever happened before. They'd fallen asleep together, but he'd never woken up to find her still in bed with him. She was always either gone, or on her way out the door. "Why?"

He pulled his hand away from his eyes when Bella didn't answer his question to see her staring across the two pillows at him. She leaned in and kissed his cheek before sitting up and swinging her legs off the bed. "Happy birthday, Edward."

#

It had taken hours to talk Jasper out some sort of extravagant and debauchery-filled celebration. All Edward wanted on his birthday was quiet time spent with his family and friends. It was a concept Jasper struggled with, but then again, Jasper had trouble understanding why 'because it's Tuesday' wasn't a valid reason for beer pong. Eventually Edward had won out—it was his birthday after all—which is how he found himself standing inside Jasper's house, staring at the girl he'd woken up to twice that morning.

She had been there already when Edward had walked in the door, and nervously tapped her fingers against the silver-wrapped box she had sitting over her lap. She leapt up when he walked into the living room and threw her arms around him; the box lay forgotten on the sofa. Any residual awkwardness left from the morning had apparently dissipated in the hours before.

"Happy birthday!" It didn't matter that she'd already wished him well.

Bella had on a dark blouse that was cut just low enough, and that was all Edward noticed before she knocked the wind out of him. After managing to draw air back into his lungs, he found the presence of mind to hug her back and mutter, "Thanks."

This was the real celebration. Having dinner with his parents later, that was the norm, even if their birthday tradition of eating dinner together at midnight wasn't exactly ordinary by anyone else's standards. That was just how they'd always celebrated birthdays.

He hadn't understood why they did it until he was a teenager. As a kid he'd thought that it was part of the fun—it was his birthday, so he got to stay up obnoxiously late. Once he was older he realized that Esme planned for midnight dinners because it was easier to make sure his dad would be able to attend. He didn't know if he'd ever manage to suss out all the little things his mom did to give Edward and Carlisle as much time together as possible.

Jasper, on the other hand, liked to live it up.

Bella released the death grip she had around Edward's neck, and when she took a step back it was all he could do not to laugh.

"Are you wearing a skirt?" This was a momentous occasion.

Bella flushed. It took her a moment to come up with a response. "Yes. But I'm not sure how much longer I'll be able to stand it. There are sweats upstairs that are just calling my name."

It was so unlike her. It made the day feel like an occasion, like something that was really and truly important to her, instead of just another day where the three of them were coming up with nonsensical reasons for a get together. She put on a skirt for him. That had to mean something. Coupled with how easy Bella was after his behavior that morning, Edward was feeling a bit braver than usual.

He leaned in to whisper in her ear. "I like the skirt."

He'd never seen her blush so much in all the time he'd known her.

"Okay," she said back, just as quiet.

A blinding flash went off to Edward's right, and he looked to the right to see Jasper holding Bella's polaroid camera, smirking as he flapped the developing photo. "Are you two finished? This is already the lamest party I've ever heard of; don't ruin it by making those faces at each other all night, too."

"There's nothing wrong with wanting a quiet night," Bella argued. She snatched the picture from Jasper, adding, "And doing that doesn't help any."

"I wasn't going to go overboard."

Bella glared at Jasper and hissed, "You wanted to hire a stripper!"

"Hey! I offered you the job first!" Jasper's poor choice of retort nearly got him slapped. Edward was a little sad that Bella managed to restrain herself.

He hadn't expected it to just be the three of them. Even though Jasper had promised not to invite the whole town, Edward had still thought that there would be at least a few other people; Bella must have stopped him. Still, he'd have thought Alice, at least, would have been invited. Maybe she was. It was nearly impossible to keep track of whether or not she and Jasper were on the rocks.

Bella forced a smile on her face, and before he knew it he was dragged across the house to sit on the couch, and a box was unceremoniously dropped in his lap.

"Presents. Then cake." The look on Bella's face told him that arguing would do him no good. Maybe she was still feeling a bit sensitive about what had happened that morning.

"Isn't that backwards?" Jasper asked. "I thought presents were supposed to be last, that way Edward has to suffer through his curiosity for as long as possible."

Bella rolled her eyes. "That's ridiculous. Everyone knows presents should be first."

"What kind of cake did you wind up with?" Edward asked, pulling apart the edges of paper taped to the box in his lap. She'd done a ridiculously thorough job at wrapping it, and Edward assumed that meant she had been nervous about whatever it was inside.

"What?" Bella hummed, her eyes trained on his fingers as he ripped the wrapping paper away. "Oh. Chocolate. The cake is chocolate."

Edward balled up the paper and pulled the lid from the top of the gift. Once he'd dealt with a layer of tissue he felt a grin spread over his face. He couldn't remember laughing so hard in his entire life. Folded inside the box was a sweatshirt proudly proclaiming 'Boston College' across the front, or at least, that's what it originally said. Bella had taken a black marker and crossed out the lettering and written in 'Harvard' underneath.

"What the hell is up with you two and Boston?" Jasper asked.

"You don't remember?" He wasn't really that surprised. What was intriguing was that apparently Bella hadn't ever clarified the joke. It was something that had remained theirs all this time.

As if she knew exactly what he was thinking, and just how much it meant to him, Bella turned her head and told Jasper, "It's nothing."

Jasper shrugged, not bothered that he wasn't going to get an explanation, and dropped a sturdy messenger bag in Edward's lap. Edward wasn't sure what to think; it was surprising, to say the least. Less surprising was the bottle of bourbon inside. "For school."

Edward glanced up, but Jasper shook his head—an indication that no, he didn't want to talk about it. Edward figured it could have meant one of two things; Jasper might be trying to show that he was starting to get on board with the whole 'growing up' thing, but it was more likely that Jasper had decided he wanted to give Edward something that he needed to couple with something that he really, really didn't.

"Isn't that the same thing you bought me for my birthday last year?" Bella snorted and pulled the bag from Edward's lap. She poked through the pockets absently for a moment before glancing up. "Oh, never mind. I got the complete works of Dr. Seuss and tickets to a monster truck rally in Seattle."

"Just trying to appeal to your maturity level."

"Now, now, children." Edward didn't even attempt to keep the sarcasm from his tone. He was starting to think he spent far too much time with Jasper, though, to be fair; Jasper had to have picked up the habit of treating everyone like squabbling kids from Chief Swan.

It was clear Bella made the same connection, because she shook her head at Edward and leaned to her right to grab a small bag from the floor next to her. "This one's from Charlie."

Edward didn't even need to look inside the bag. Every year since he'd passed his driver's test and gotten his license, Charlie had given him road flares and one or two other items for his car. Only Charlie would think roadside safety items made for a wonderful gift—Edward loved them.

"Gotta love the Chief." Jasper snickered and grinned at Bella. "If I didn't know better, I'd think he assumed we can't go anywhere without running into all sorts of trouble."

"I wonder where he got that idea," Bella said with a pointed look. She stood, and when she leaned toward Edward to gather the bits of wrapping paper from the couch he could have sworn she was going to kiss him. He didn't know he was capable of feeling so disappointed when she gulped and straightened without as much as a smile.

He felt a little better when he noticed that she looked a little shaken, too. "Cake. We need cake."

"You talk about cake way too much," Edward said. Bella blushed

Jasper stood as well, and cocked his head to the side with a mischievous smile. "Maybe the cake is a metaphor. I wonder what it is that dear Bella really needs."

"You are supposed to be being nice."

"I _am_."

Edward didn't think he'd ever able to be comfortable with the way Jasper and Bella bickered with such familiarity. Jealousy was still something he had trouble dealing with, though it was much easier when Bella did something like grab his hand and pull him toward the kitchen table instead of just walking ahead. The entirely too large chocolate-frosted cake she set in front of him helped a bit, too.

"Make a wi—"

Edward didn't give her time to finish. He let out a sharp gust of air and watched as the tiny flames burst into hypnotic curls of smoke. It was silly, to make wishes on candles, but he couldn't stop himself any more than he could avoid the sudden memory of that night and what it had felt like to let all the boundaries came crashing down once better judgement became trivial.

Jasper was smirking at him like he knew _exactly_ what Edward had wished for. Edward wondered just what it was that Jasper knew, and how close to the mark it was. He was starting to think that maybe he'd taken Jasper's ignorance of the situation for granted. Edward was so busy trying to pick apart just what Jasper might know that he didn't even notice Bella had cut him a slice of the cake until Jasper caught his eye and glanced down at the plate in front of him.

"Jesus Christ, did you _make_ this?" Edward groaned after taking a bite. "This is the best cake ever."

"Your mom gave me the recipe."

"She's right, I don't appreciate her enough."

Bella looked down at her plate and smiled. "I'm glad you like it. Even if you were completely unhelpful with choosing it."

He almost told her that holding out on her was well worth the hour he got her to lay in his bed, but managed to restrain himself. "You can't ask me questions that early in the morning. It's just cruel."

"Don't tell me you don't enjoy Bella's wake-up calls," Jasper said with a mouthful of cake. Jasper winked at Bella, causing her cheeks to flush.

Edward spent the next ten minutes expending all his effort into seeming unaffected. He doubted he was convincing anyone.

He was overreacting and he knew it. On better days he was able to see the world around him more clearly, but the events of the morning and that so vivid dream had been thundering through his head all day. He felt like he was teetering over the edge of something he couldn't name, and even the tiniest of shoves would be enough to send him falling over. Some days, like today, he thought that Jasper understood this, and was steadily trying to push him too far.

He grabbed the plates and forks when they were cleared and made his way to the kitchen, desperate for just one minute where he could be frustrated and confused without having to pretend he wasn't.

He thought about tossing the dishes in the garbage can for a few seconds; he wondered if the clanging would make him feel any better.

Bella gave him a curious look when she came into the kitchen. He must have looked deranged glaring down at the trash can like it owed him something. Edward shook himself from his stupor and took four strides to the sink instead of destroying the dishes Jasper didn't even care about.

Something had to give, and soon.

"You shouldn't be doing the dishes on your birthday," Bella chided. She leaned against the counter and gave him a glare that he supposed was supposed to be intimidating; she didn't quite manage.

"It's fine."

Bella certainly didn't think so, judging from her expression, but she let it slide for the moment. "So tell me, Edward Cullen, how does it feel to be past your angsty and tumultuous teenage years?"

He wanted to tell her that he was done with swimming against currents and deluding himself into believing that he shouldn't be fighting for her. He wanted to say that she was the most beautiful girl he'd ever met. He wanted to tell her that someday, somehow he was going to spend the rest of his life with the girl that he loved, no matter how many obstacles fell in his path. Instead he smiled and said, "Would it be incredibly cliché if I told you I wanted to go to Disney Land?"

"A little bit, yeah." Bella laughed.

"I'm going to stop beating around bushes," Edward said, focusing far too much on the simple task of washing the three plates in the sink. It wasn't surprising that Bella refused to take the bait, and instead grabbed a dry towel from the drawer on her left and set to drying off the plates as he washed them.

"It's almost eleven-thirty." Bella nodded toward Edward's watch. He was surprised she remembered his family's peculiar way of celebrating birthdays. As if to answer him, she said, "I pay attention."

"Sometimes," Edward challenged.

Bella nodded. "Alright, fine. Sometimes. But you only get to win because it's your birthday."

"You want to come to dinner?" Edward asked, keeping his voice low. For some reason it felt like if he asked too loudly, she'd be spooked for sure.

"I don't want to intrude." He could have guessed she'd say those exact words in that precise order.

"You won't be."

"Maybe another time."

Edward hadn't realized just how much he wanted her to come along until she shot him down. He wanted her sitting next to him at his dining room table, laughing with his mom. He wanted her watch the way she squirmed under Carlisle's stare, because she never got to spend all that much time with the man, and she still didn't know what to make of him. He wanted it all with her.

He decided to try again. "I'd really like it if you came to dinner. My mom won't stop talking about you; it might shut her up for a bit."

Bella glanced sideways at him, a hint of amusement sparkling in her eye. "Is that so?"

"I think she might be seriously considering trying to steal you from Charlie, the way she goes on about not seeing you enough. She even started trying to make me cook with her." Edward wrinkled his nose in distaste. He had no objections to spending time with his mother, far from it, but cooking wasn't really his thing, and he was terrible at it to boot.

"The horror," Bella said dryly, shoving him out from in front of the sink. She scrubbed at the dirty forks a bit harder than was necessary. "I told you, no dishes on your birthday."

"You better hurry then, or we'll be late." He couldn't contain his grin when, for once, she didn't argue with him. It was a small victory, but a win nonetheless. Apparently persistence was the key with Bella. He'd have to keep that in mind.

Edward decided right then and there, standing in the middle of the kitchen watching Bella rinse off the last plate, that he didn't care about all the why not's anymore. Emmett would be pissed, that much was a given. The thing was that Edward was starting to see that Emmett would also come around eventually—but if he did nothing, if he let whatever this thing he felt for Bella pass him by, he wasn't ever going to be able to look at her without wondering what could have been.

He'd wait for her to catch up, but when she did, all bets were off. It was time to stop running in place.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Since I'm back at work full-time there's not going to be much of an update schedule from here on out. I'll try to keep it at once a week though. I happen to like Thursdays :-)**


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: Beta'd by SweeneyAnne and preread by aerobee82 & AlexisDanaan. 333**

**Don't own Twilight.**

* * *

><p><strong><span>July 23, 2010<span>**

Bella sat on her heels facing Edward, and was so excited she nearly shook the entire couch with her bouncing. Edward didn't think she realized she was doing it. He hadn't even noticed at first. Bella's default setting was to fidget, and after sitting next to her bouncing leg for a few weeks he'd learned to tune it out.

"Why are you here again?" It didn't make any sense. Emmett wasn't going to stop by to visit him before he went home.

Her answer was immediate, and he worried that letting her drink that fourth cup of coffee was a bad idea. He should have known better. "Because Charlie told me if I kept it up he was going to throw me in jail until I calmed down."

"I can't imagine why." He stifled a yawn and scratched his fingers through his hair in an attempt to get himself to wake up a bit more. Bella couldn't sit still on a normal day—add excitement and caffeine and the girl was pretty much hopeless. Edward rolled his eyes and berated himself for thinking her enthusiasm was adorable. He was getting in way too deep.

"I can't help it. I haven't seen Em in _forever_." She stood and paced in front of the sofa for the fourth time. The production was almost funny enough to be worth being woken up at the ass-crack of dawn. Almost.

"Neither have I, but you don't see me running around waking people up at six in the morning," he grumbled.

"Don't even try to pretend like you're upset about it. You are a nineteen year old boy. You loved waking up to a girl jumping on your bed."

The problem was that he'd enjoyed it far too much—she'd interrupted an increasingly common dream centered on brown hair and little creases at the corner of a mouth he refused to admit was hers—but he wasn't about to tell Bella that. "You have got to learn what the word 'boundaries' means. You scared the shit out of me."

"I'll never forget that look on your face. Priceless."

"I still don't know what I did to deserve such a delightful wake-up call. I would have thought you'd go after Jasper."

Bella stilled and shuddered. "The last time I went to Jasper's in the morning, Alice was there. It was _not_ pretty."

"So you figured waking me up would be less traumatizing?" Edward asked. He was actually quite amused by the face Bella was making at the memory of coming face to face with Alice in the morning—some cross of fury and nausea that made her look more confused than either.

"_Much_."

She sat next to him with a dramatic huff and fell sideways. Her head landed right in his lap, and he almost reached out to pull his fingers through the loose locks of hair fanning over his jeans before he remembered that she was likely to flip her shit if he did. She was far too casual; it made it too easy to forget that there were certain lines he'd promised himself he wouldn't cross.

Admiration from afar was one thing. Actually touching her hair was another.

"I hate just sitting around waiting for something to happen." she groaned, rolling on to her back to stare up at him. The angle made him extremely uncomfortable, but there wasn't anything he could do about it.

Or, maybe there was.

"Come on." He grabbed her arm and tugged her up from the couch. He pulled a little too hard, and when she stood she crashed into his chest with a sharp exhale.

"You know you're supposed to buy a girl dinner before you do this kind of stuff."

Edward had been so sure he was done making himself look like an idiot in front of her. For what it was worth, she never really seemed to mind. He let her regain her footing before taking a step back and sticking his hand in his pocket to make sure he had his keys and wallet. "You're going to drive me insane if we stay here. We're going out."

Edward paused at the front door and waited for Bella to pass, and when she walked by him he leaned in and said, "And I bought you dinner last week."

"Fast food doesn't count," Bella argued. "What sort of a cheap date do you take me for?"

Edward thought he must be getting better at the whole ignore it until it goes away thing, because the word 'date' only made him falter for a moment before he regained his composure; or maybe he was just getting used to hearing those sorts of things from Bella.

She was quiet until halfway to their destination; the only indication that Edward wasn't alone in the car was the constant sight of her bouncing leg in the corner of his vision. It was like Bella was incapable of sitting still for more than two minutes—yet another thing she had in common with Jasper.

"Where are we going?" Bella asked. Her gaze was carefully trained in front of her, and Edward could just see those gears whizzing in her head as she tracked the landmarks and street signs trying to figure out the answer.

"It's a surprise."

"I hate surprises." She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. It was kind of cute, the way she tried so hard to look fierce but couldn't quite manage it.

"That sucks for you then."

"Jerk." She didn't sound like she meant it at all, and Edward couldn't help but smile at the way she squirmed.

Edward took the next right, and he could pinpoint the exact moment Bella figured out where they were going. He glanced over to see her eyebrows furrow and her lips press into a thin line; he couldn't decide if she looked more irritated or confused. He assumed it must be the latter, because she didn't say anything until he pulled into one of the parking spots closest to the football field.

"Why in the world did you bring me to the school?" Bella looked at him like he was crazy.

"You'll see," Edward promised. He'd intended to circle the car to open Bella's door for her, but by the time he'd walked to the front of the car she'd already climbed out.

"Where exactly are we headed?" Bella asked as they treaded across the damp lawn. Edward didn't think it would ever stop amusing him, the way she could bounce back and forth between thoughtful silence and constant questions.

He let her stew until they were standing in front of the bleachers. Edward was suddenly uneasy bringing Bella here, but he couldn't have said why, and it was too late to do anything about it anyway. He hesitantly motioned in front of them. "Up."

Bella climbed the risers first. Edward was right behind her, wondering if there was any balance in the precarious situation he'd found himself in. It wasn't like he could actually pursue anything with Bella, but he was also starting to think that he might not be able to stay satisfied with what they had. He could swear she was flirting with him earlier…

"So," Bella said, interrupting the debate raging in his head as she took a seat near the middle of the bleachers, "This was your grand scheme to get me to calm down? Bring me out to the football field? I thought you were supposed to try to entice the girls to go _under_ the bleachers with you."

And there it was again.

"Just… look." Edward couldn't explain why this place made him feel the way it did.

"I don't think I get it," Bella laughed.

"You don't like it?" There was an irrational and utterly confusing longing present that she would understand.

"I didn't say that. It is oddly beautiful," Bella conceded, and she leaned to rest her head against his shoulder. He spent far too long considering all the pros and cons of letting his arm drift around her back.

"See?" Edward said smugly. "You're less jittery already."

Bella went still. "Yep."

"You're going crazy trying not to fidget now, aren't you?"

"No." She was lying through her teeth.

He let her stew for a few minutes, mostly because he wasn't sure what to do. Eventually he reasoned that she couldn't possibly be comfortable in that position, as tense as she was, and that was all the excuse he needed to snake his arm around her waist and tug her a little closer. Bella relaxed, and Edward smiled out at the empty football field. It was a good moment.

The spell was broken when Bella jumped at the sound of her phone chirping in her pocket, and Edward had to lean out of the way so her elbow wouldn't clip him on the chin.

"Finally!"

In his haste to follow her Edward lost his balance when he stood and fell back to the risers with a huff. "Fuck."

"Are you okay?" Bella asked, peering down at him. There was confusion, worry, and laughter all fighting to take over her expression.

"Gravity is so fucking hateful," Edward muttered. He picked himself up and she glanced over him as he stretched his arms out and made sure that nothing actually hurt. This shit only happened when she was around. "I'm fine. Come on; let's go see your brother."

She was gone like a shot, halfway to his car before he'd even made it down the rest of the bleachers.

#

This time it had been Emmett who wanted to play poker, thankfully without the added 'fun' of Jasper's house rules. Emmett also wanted to smoke cigars and drink scotch. This was how Edward found himself sitting at Jasper's poker table, yet again, while Emmett swirled the liquid in his tumbler and failed miserably at trying to pretend he had a decent hand. Edward had no idea how it was that Bella—who was essentially transparent in all aspects—could be so good at poker, and Emmett could be so terrible.

Jasper seemed content to let Emmett dig his own grave before going after Edward. Edward just figured he'd quit before Jasper decided he wanted to put some effort into winning.

"What's the story with this chick Bella can't shut the fuck up about?" Jasper asked after half an hour of easy quiet.

"Rosalie?"

"Unless you have another blonde beach babe stashed away down there…"

"It's so good to be home." Emmett laughed. "Rose's the only one, asshole. She's great. She's in Rochester visiting some friends, but you'll get to meet her in a couple of weeks. When we go back we're going to get a place together. She's ridiculously excited to paint for some reason."

Emmett rolled his eyes toward the end, but it was with a fondness that wasn't lost on either Jasper or Edward.

"You're really into this girl, huh?" Jasper asked.

Emmett smiled. "Yeah. She's smart and she's nice. She just… she gets me. What more do you need?"

"You do realize that you sound completely whipped," Jasper laughed.

Emmett took a long pull from his bottle and nodded his head. "I'm going to ask her to marry me."

"For real?" If Edward hadn't known better he would have sworn Jasper had absolutely no idea that Emmett and Rosalie's relationship was so serious. Edward's attempt at nonchalance was far less impressive, but Emmett didn't notice that Edward's smile was nearly as big as his.

"Yeah. Charlie said I could have his mother's ring. I'm thinking I'll ask when she comes to visit. She doesn't really have any family she's close with, and I think she'd like to get to make a big deal of it."

"What if she doesn't say 'yes'?" Jasper teased.

Emmett just smirked. "Oh, she's gonna say yes."

Edward didn't know how Emmett could possibly be so confident, but this was a subject he knew next to nothing about. What he did know was that Emmett was a perpetually cautious being when it came to building relationships; it had taken quite a bit of time before he'd even become comfortable with Bella and Charlie. If Emmett was sure this was where his life was heading, well, he would know.

"You excited?" Edward asked.

Emmett grinned, bright and wide, and leaned back in his chair. "Fuck yes, man. You guys will be groomsmen, right?"

"What, wait," Jasper cut in immediately. "Who's gonna be your best man?"

"I doubt we'll do the best man, maid of honor thing."

"Why not?" Edward wondered. He worried that he may have crossed some sort of line by asking when Emmett took a swig of his drink and considered how to respond for longer than usual.

"I think if Rose had it her way, we'd just go down to city hall and get it over with, but I know that's not what she really wants. She's kind of hung up on the fact that she doesn't have a lot of people who would care enough to come—at least she thinks so anyway. Her parents have pretty much disowned her. I think she doesn't want to deal with the whole wedding thing because she's worried her dad won't come to walk her down the aisle.

"This is my compromise. We'll throw all that typical wedding shit out the window and do it our way, and in the end I think she'll be happy that she got the fanfare without all the drama."

"That's an awful lot of planning you've done without having even asked her yet," Jasper pointed out.

Emmett just shrugged. "We've talked about it. It's more a matter of making it official."

"Who talks about that shit before they're even engaged?" Jasper scoffed.

"People, who are in healthy, committed relationships." Emmett didn't seem all that surprised that he needed to explain. "What about you? Got a girl waiting for you back in Cambridge?"

Edward didn't even know where to begin to answer that question. He certainly wasn't going to tell Emmett that his sister had somehow managed to worm her way into his dreams and refused to get out. It figured; even in his imagination Bella was stubborn as hell.

"No, no girl in Cambridge," Edward answered. It wasn't lying, exactly, but it wasn't really telling the truth either. It was easier to deliberately misunderstand the intent of Emmett's question.

"Give it time," Emmett replied.

"Why don't I run to the kitchen and whip us up some cosmos so we can grab the eyelash curlers and talk about our sappy, sappy feelings some more," Jasper snarked. "Maybe we can braid each other's hair and paint our nails, too."

"Hey, it's not my fault you don't get it." Emmett laughed and flicked one of his poker chips at Jasper. It hit him right in the middle of his forehead. "'Sides, if you want your hair braided again all you gotta do is ask Bella."

"Oh, man," Jasper laughed. Edward had a very bad feeling about this. "You should have seen the job she did on Edward a few weeks ago. Fucking priceless."

"Please tell me Bella got pictures of this one, too," Emmett snickered.

Jasper paled, and Edward focused a little more attention on him. "She got you, too, huh? I've gotta find these pictures."

"I don't think she can even help herself. You know how that girls is; always has to be moving. Fuck it. Try to find 'em if you want. I looked awesome." Edward immediately made plans to peruse the board of polaroids in Bella's room in search of some blackmail material.

"He really didn't." Emmett snorted. "She'd done almost his entire head by the time he noticed. Charlie said he almost bust a lung it was so hard not to laugh."

"At least I didn't _let_ her turn me into her own personal, life-sized barbie doll," Jasper said with a pointed look toward Emmett.

"She was nine! I was just being a good brother."

"That girl has got to learn how to sit still," Jasper muttered, and though his words were laced with irritation, he had a bit of a grin on his face. Edward did, too.

"How's she been doing?" Emmett asked. "I didn't get to see much of her today. Thought she was going to tie me to one of the kitchen chairs and force me to tell her every single detail of my life since I've been away. She even tried to get me to go to work with her."

"She's been fine," Jasper shrugged. "Had a bit of a rough start this year, but fuck, like that's surprising."

Edward found himself listening intently as Jasper outlined a few of the less personal highlights of Bella's year for Emmett. He hadn't ever really thought about what she might have to deal with in the absence of Emmett. It was just like she'd said to him—almost all of her friends had come attached to Emmett, and this year the only one who hadn't left was Jasper.

"She's good now, though, right?" Emmett asked. Sincerity overtook Jasper for a moment as he nodded, and just as quick as it came, it was gone. Emmett gave a nod back in reply, and the whole moment was over. Edward had barely noticed it happening.

Edward had a few questions he wanted to ask, but Jasper was already giving him far too many curious glances; even Emmett looked suspicious. They would have to wait.

#

"You're really going to make me do this, aren't you?" Jasper groaned and shot a dirty look at Edward. "You're actually going to sit there, not paying any attention to the game, until I ask you what has your panties in a twist."

Edward's vision sharpened and he pressed a few random buttons on his controller in an effort to convince Jasper he hadn't completely zoned out. He was getting sick of constantly trying to battle and repress one of the only things in his world that he was genuinely interested in. It made him feel heavy.

It had been a good afternoon. Once the conversation had drifted from girls to far more inane topics Edward finally managed to relax and enjoy himself. Having Emmett back in town made him feel more at home. Like Forks was finally Forks again, instead of some vague representation of where he'd lived before he went off to college.

Bella had stopped by to pick up Emmett after her shift ended. Edward was bothered that she didn't come in, until he realized that her staying in the truck didn't mean anything beyond the obvious, because there was no reason it would. She was probably tired and in a hurry to get home. Maybe she didn't want to get sucked into a conversation with Jasper instead of spending quality time with her brother. There were dozens of possible reasons.

While Emmett was away it was almost easy. For moments that lasted anywhere from seconds to hours he forgot what Emmett was likely to do if he ever found out what sort of sordid dreams drifted through his mind as he slept. He could ignore the fact that there was no denying it now, he and Bella were friends in a real way instead of through obligatory courtesy, and complicating that balance would likely ruin it in the end. None of the snags or obstacles mattered; it was so freeing to be in her presence. That had to mean something, but he could never figure out what because he was caught up in a crazed and cyclical argument with himself.

The truth was that if Edward accepted certain uncertainties as fact, then he knew exactly what the problem was. There were rules. Look, but don't touch. Dream, but don't act. Edward knew that if it was his sister Jasper or Emmett wanted to go after, then he wouldn't be okay with anything less than complete and total commitment. There were boundaries, and there were long standing friendships and loyalties that had to be weighed against what he hoped to get out of this thing with Bella. As long as he wasn't sure what he wanted, he was stuck.

He was thinking about this shit far too much.

"Dude, where the fuck is your head at?" Jasper asked. He clipped Edward on the shoulder and shot a look of annoyance in his direction. "You're not even trying anymore."

"Just thinking." He didn't feel any need to elaborate.

"I mean it. You and I are going to have to have a talk about your behavior at some point," Jasper threatened. "I am _not_ looking forward to it, so just do me a favor—straighten your shit out."

Edward kept his gaze steadily focused on the screen, but he nodded, once, because Jasper wasn't the kind of guy who liked saying that kind of stuff, and Edward appreciated the gesture.

Edward had always considered himself to be more adept with dealing with his emotions than Jasper, but as he mulled over the way Jasper seemed to know every time his mind slipped away from him, he had to consider that maybe Jasper was only stunted when it came to his own feelings. It wasn't just the subtle prods away from his thoughts, either. It was the way Jasper noticed every time he let his gaze linger on Bella for just a little too long, even the vague and nearly accusatory comments made at that poker game almost two months ago.

It was the first time that Edward had ever wondered if maybe, in this case, he was the one who was incapable of seeing things clearly.


End file.
